


End To Which

by succeeding



Series: Glass [3]
Category: Batman - All Media Types, Nightwing (Comics), Young Justice (Cartoon)
Genre: Asexual Dick Grayson, Batfamily (DCU) Feels, Bruce Wayne Tries to Be a Good Parent, Bruce Wayne is Bad at Feelings, Bruce Wayne is a Good Parent, Childhood Sexual Abuse, Damian Wayne Loves Dick Grayson, Dick Grayson Has Issues, Dick Grayson Has Panic Attacks, Dick Grayson Needs a Hug, Dick Grayson is Bad at Feelings, Dick Grayson is Damian Wayne’s Parent, Everyone In The Batfamily Is Bad At Feelings, Explicit Language, Family Feels, Gen, Hurt Dick Grayson, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, Jason Todd Has Issues, Past Child Abuse, Past Rape/Non-con, Past Sexual Abuse, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Protective Jason Todd, Rape/Non-con Elements, Unreliable Narrator
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-06-23
Updated: 2020-12-31
Packaged: 2021-03-03 23:02:08
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con, Underage
Chapters: 4
Words: 46,894
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24873505
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/succeeding/pseuds/succeeding
Summary: Kids are turning up dead in Gotham City. Street kids, ones who've run away or been turned out. Kids no one cares about. Dick, newly back onto the scene after his injuries, adopts it as his case. In the depths of this sickness, he finds himself gasping for air with no relief.OR: A casefic that focuses on Dick's trauma, while bringing the rest of the BatFam's in too. Everyone has a very bad time. Like,everyone.
Relationships: Batfamily Members & Dick Grayson, Dick Grayson & Bruce Wayne, Dick Grayson & Damian Wayne, Dick Grayson & Jason Todd
Series: Glass [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1745233
Comments: 293
Kudos: 481





	1. This Sickness

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As with the other fics in this series, a blanket content warning applies.

“Commissioner Gordon would like to meet with me tonight,” Bruce says, thirty one days exactly from the night Dick was burned. 

Not that he’s counting.

Dick has a bowl of both strawberries _and_ blueberries this morning. There’s also a little cup of vanilla yogurt that he’s dipping them into. 

Progress.

“What about?” 

“He said it was a case he might have for us.”

 _Us_. 

“Big?”

“No,” Bruce says, and by that he means it’s not the Joker, or Two-Face, or any of the other ‘brand-name’ criminals who continuously terrorize Gotham. 

Just because it’s not big doesn’t mean it’s not important.

“You want me to go?” he says, and he can’t hide the bit of surprise in his voice. 

“I think it would be good for you,” Bruce says, “to get out of the house. And meeting him won’t be too taxing on your foot.”

His damn foot. It’s not healing as quickly as he’d hoped it would. It’s to be expected. He hadn’t rested it after the initial breaks, and he certainly hadn’t done it any favors by running through the house, or grappling when he’d gone with Jason to retrieve Dami. 

It’s annoying. It doesn’t hurt to walk, but the moment he tries to put more impulsion behind his steps, he feels the twinge of unhappy metatarsals. Acrobatics and gymnastics are absolutely out of the question unless he wants to _really_ fuck things up, and so his ability to fight is neutralized as well. He’s not Jason or Bruce. He knows how to take hits if he has to, how to roll with it and minimize the blow, but he doesn’t have the body to absorb things the way they do, and he’s not mobile enough right now to ensure he won’t be hit.

He’s never been jealous of the way they fight, so heavy and tied to the ground, but he’s honest enough with himself to see the advantages. They don’t have to worry about retreat; they force _others_ to. Granted, both of them have had more injuries than he thinks he’ll ever see, just by merit of close-quarters combat, so if he were to tally everything up they’d come out even.

Beyond that, though, beyond not being able to fight or move the way he’s used to, he’s never been this hurt as a result of his own gymnastics. Muscle strains? Sure. Some deep and painful bruising? Okay. And he’s had stress fractures in his feet before, but an injury due to his own actions, from being upset and fleeing and not landing the right way on a move he’s done a thousand times-- that’s different. 

He’d been stupid to jump out that window. Hard uneven surface, from an unplanned height, no preparation or warmup. Vision obscured by tears, body shaking from adrenaline, thoughts frantic from the conversation. He’s lucky he only broke a couple of bones in his foot. If he were less experienced, or his body less conditioned for it, he’d have snapped an ankle or maybe blown out a knee. _Those_ were injuries that took months to heal, and could end careers forever, so in a way it was the best possible outcome. 

It doesn’t stop him from being angry with himself. It’s similar to what had happened with his face. Thoughtless, acting on impulse, because of things that happened long ago. 

He has his month follow-up next week, which happens to be perfect timing. Bruce hadn’t mentioned that Dick needed to be medically cleared to come along with him, but he knows that it’ll make everyone involved feel better to know he’s not a cripple.

Even if, well-- he’s not exactly at one hundred percent, either, whether mentally or physically. 

Healing from wounds is a gradual process. He knows that, and he also knows that some particularly sentimental people might call what’s going on in his head a wound, too, instead of just a major malfunction. 

It’s a pretty lie, one he wants to believe. 

“Thanks for inviting me,” he says. “I mean-- not sarcastically. You’re right. I do need to get out of the house.”

Maybe he can be _useful_ again. 

* * *

Batman meets Jim Gordon at night. Dusk and dawn, with their dramatic skylines produced by air pollution, are fairly common, but mostly it’s the night shift. He wonders why, through the years, Jim hasn’t demanded to meet them at a more reasonable hour. 

Maybe it’s just because the thought of Batman in broad daylight is too absurd. 

“Good evening,” Jim says, always so formal when talking to him. All the police are, with Batman. Everyone else sees a dark superhero, so strong and stern, but even in costume, Bruce is still just Bruce to him. 

Bruce returns his greeting, and Jim notices Dick in what seems to be almost shock. 

“Hey,” he says. “We haven’t seen you in a while.”

Dick is painfully aware of that, and he’s anticipated this. 

“I went on vacation,” he says. “Hawaii. Super nice this time of year.”

“Really,” he replies, and it’s obvious that he doesn’t buy it.

Dick’s lost weight. There’s no way around it. His suit is loose, despite Alfred’s alterations in preparation for tonight, and he’s sure it’s visible to someone like Gordon. It’s not much, maybe ten pounds. Most people have that to lose. 

He-- really doesn’t. His body fat percentage hovers around eight percent. Not much more to lose before it’s down to purely essential fat, what’s needed to cushion organs, and the cholesterol used by the brain. So for him, it’s come straight out of his muscle. He can feel it in the way he moves. Just a little less power to work with, maybe some lightheadedness in the workouts he’s been easing himself back into-- 

But it’s fine.

In terms of BMI he’s still solidly within the ‘normal’ range. No one can deny that. He knows Leslie would argue with him about it, because his body composition is different, much different, from that of the average person, but it comes down to the same. 

And besides. It’s because he chooses not to eat.

He _can_ , because technically a person can _do_ most anything. It’s just whether or not it’s worth it to him. And-- it’s really not.

“We didn’t come here for a social call,” Bruce says, and Dick’s thankful to him, because he doesn’t have the heart to be snippy with Jim. Not now, and not ever. Not just because he’s Barbara’s dad, and she’s protective of him, but also because…

Jim has been one of the constants in his life, as weird as that sounds. 

Dick has known him since he was, what, nine? Yeah, he’d started this life at nine. He remembers Jim’s appalled face the first time he’d seen Robin, and how he’d slowly gotten accustomed to it. When he'd been a kid, Jim had snuck him fun-sized candy bars. Bruce never objected in the first place, but he and Jim had turned it into a game-- how many Dick could eat during their meetings before Bruce ‘caught on’ and complained about sugar intake. He knew from the beginning, of course, because he was Batman and nothing escaped his notice, but he usually let Jim smuggle him five or six little Twix or Snickers without mention. 

When Dick had-- _gotten back_ , he’d ignored the offered candies, and Jim’s face had been so sad. He’d been irritated by it. He wasn’t a child, he didn’t want candy any more, he didn’t need to be _humored_. He’d said as much to him, in a snapped instance when it was just the two of them.

He still, still feels guilty about it. How Jim had frozen and just replied, “You’re right, you’re not a kid any more,” while slipping the candy back into his pocket.

Some part of Dick wishes he’d kept offering. 

“Of course,” Jim says, and he goes for his papers. It’s funny how, even in the digital era, so much police work is still on hard copy. He sorts them out and looks down at one page in particular. 

“Two years ago we got reports of a teenage girl wrapped in Tyvek sheeting. Significant blunt force trauma. Found in the attic of an unfinished house.”

Gotham’s periodic economic slumps are a breeding ground for abandoned buildings. Sometimes outside investors bought old buildings planning to renovate them, but never did, and other times developers planned to put in a new housing tract but ran out of funding. Without fail, they get taken back by the city’s undertow. Anyone and everyone looking for a place to hide, or to perform unsavory activities, or do some stupid spraypainting. Drugs, or gangs, or the homeless, or prostitutes, or dumb teenagers wanting a thrill. Pick any and all of them.

“We thought it was an isolated incident,” Jim says. “We can’t-- we can’t focus on everything.”

“I understand,” Bruce intones. 

“Well,” Jim says, “some squatters found a second body two months ago. Male, this time. It was similar to the girl, place and likely cause of death, but--”

“But you can’t focus on everything,” Dick repeats. 

He doesn’t know why he said it. On the surface it seems as though he’s commiserating, agreeing that GCPD is stretched too thin and that Jim doesn’t have a deep enough well to investigate every dead kid. All that’s true.

But he says it so _meanly_ , and he feels bad when Jim licks his lips and continues. 

“A week ago we got another call. Same situation.”

“You would like our help,” Bruce says, and it’s not a question but rather a confirmation.

There are many reasons, none of them good, why Gotham kids might be found dead, and it’s certainly not unusual in the least, but he knows why Jim’s reaching out. If there’s a third kid, killed and… disposed of… in the same way, it brings into the possible diagnostic category of a serial killer: three or more victims, killed in separate incidents. 

That’s one thing Gotham doesn’t need more of. 

“Who are the kids?”

“First we never identified,” Jim says. “Second and third-- street kids, likely sex workers.”

“Never reported as missing persons?”

“You know how it is,” Jim says, “especially in Gotham.”

Dick knows intellectually, but he doesn’t _know_ , not really, because he can’t imagine anyone trying anything less than their hardest to find him. 

It’s difficult, these kinds of cases. Children in general are hard. They’ve always been hard. But the ones who no one had cared enough to report, the ones that no one had managed to _save_ , the ones who’d slipped away in the night from adults who couldn’t be bothered to give a single fuck--

Those break his heart. No matter how many times he sees it, it hurts. He doesn’t understand it at all. 

Bruce had driven himself nearly insane trying to find him when he was gone. He’d enlisted as much help as he possibly could-- the entire Justice League, and all its subsidiaries, had gotten the info about him. Maybe they couldn’t focus the way Bruce did, since they had their own problems and villains and missions, but they all kept their eye out for him. And Bruce and his team-- they would never have given up on him, no matter how many months went by. He knows that, even if during his captivity he’d had fleeting moments of wondering otherwise. 

Now that he’s a parent himself, or as close as one can be to a kid like Damian, he feels it even more deeply. There’s such a difference between how these dead kids get treated, and how Damian’s taken care of. He’d been away for just a couple of hours before they all knew and started searching, and even the few days he’d been gone had seemed immeasurable. He’d have torn apart the world with his bare hands, if that was what it took to get Damian back. 

It’s frightening to love anything that much, especially a child who, by definition of being a child, might stupidly endanger themselves, or do something risky, or--

He tunes back into the conversation. It’s a problem that’s gotten worse, recently. He tries to pay attention to what people say, but finds that his mind just… wanders. And this isn’t a casual conversation. This is a briefing over a series of murders.

He needs to focus.

“I don’t have the staff,” Jim is saying. “I wish I did, but I don’t. In between everything else, this is seen as just something that happens.”

Bruce takes the folder. 

“We’ll look into it,” he says. “Good night, Gordon.”

Typical Bruce brusqueness.

“B,” he says, when they’re in the Batmobile and Bruce is filing the papers away into a casebook.

“Yes?”

“Thank you,” and it feels so unnecessary, because he _knows_ how Bruce feels, and has felt, and forever will feel, about him. “Thank you, for not forgetting me. For not-- giving up.”

Despite the cowl, it’s his father’s face looking back at him. His father who, through all the arguments and disagreements, has always been there for him, ready and willing to sacrifice everything for his child. 

“I would die,” Bruce says, “before that ever happened. In the past, or now, or in the future.” 

Dick thinks of searching and looking and seeking and never ever finding. He thinks of how the empty hallways had echoed with his footsteps as he’d ran to Rose’s rooms, and the utter panic that had overwhelmed him. He thinks of his days as a police officer, all those dark streets and alleys, and the people huddled in sheltering places, and the horrible tenements that were in a way worse than being homeless. 

He thinks of having no one to worry, no one to find him. It’s unfathomable, but if it had been the case-- that knowledge, that would have killed him more surely than a knife to his throat. He’d never have survived his days with Slade.

And he thinks of these kids now, what’ll be his first case since… everything. 

And he decides that he’ll care for them, even if this heartless city doesn't. 

* * *

He goes to Jason’s afterward, to tell him about the case. Jason listens with impassivity, looking unsurprised, as if he knows the whole story already.

“Happens a lot,” he says. “I’m amazed they’re actually giving a fuck this time.” 

He can’t argue with that. He feels a little sympathy on the behalf of the police department-- Jim does try, and in Bludhaven he’d known some good cops who begged for permission to investigate missing street kids. But in terms of political capital, it looks much better to foil some supervillain’s plot than to search for children who had no one missing them anyway. 

They’re in the kitchen, where Jason’s mixing a margarita. He’d been in the middle of squeezing limes and oranges when Dick had come to the door. 

Dick looks on not _longingly_ , per se, because he’s never been a drinker, and the last time he’d touched alcohol it had been at that skeevy bar, and before that, a total catastrophe. But the sight of the fresh fruit juices, and the thought of the salt on the rim, and the fact that he’s with Jason, who’s _safe_ \--

Jason catches his look. 

“You get _one_ drink,” he says. “ _One_. Better savor it, bucko.”

“I don’t think I could handle more than one anyway.” 

“Empty stomach?” 

“Eh,” Dick says. “Maybe.” 

Jason tosses him an orange. 

“Vitamin C,” he says. “Can’t get fuckin’ scurvy on us.” 

Dick laughs a little and begins to peel it. 

“Never understood that,” Jason says. “The peeling. I always just take a knife and cut it into quarters.” 

“Peeling it is half the fun.” 

“If you say so.” 

He goes back to making the margaritas while Dick eats the orange. It’s fresh and ripe, not the nearly green ones they sell at most supermarkets. Jason must have gotten them from a fruit stand. 

Jason hands him his margarita --complete with neon straw-- and they head into the living room. Jason pulls the blanket out from the ottoman again and throws it to him. Dick catches it without sloshing his drink. 

“You should be fuckin grateful,” Jason says, “that I waited for _you_ to watch the next episode of Desperate Housewives.” 

“You’ve seen the _entire series_.” 

“Only two times.” 

“Okay, Jason, thank you very much for waiting _a few days_ to watch another episode of a series that you’ve already seen twice.” 

It feels so natural, this ribbing and good-natured repartee. He wonders why they hadn’t been this way before. Before Jason had died and come back full of rightful rage, and vengeance, and hatred. 

He knows it was mostly his fault. 

They watch the episode Jason apparently couldn’t wait to see. There’s a somewhat dramatic hostage situation in a supermarket, but from what he’s seen in real life-- well, it doesn’t compare. Gaby and her (soon-to-be-ex) husband meet up and agree to stop trying to make each other miserable, even if they can’t stay married.

It’s not exactly erudite entertainment, but the characters mesh well together, and the plotlines are just the right mix of drama and comedy. It never gets too serious.

It’s perfect. He barely realizes when the episode’s over. 

“So, today,” Jason says. He’s paused the loading screen for the next episode. 

“Today,” Dick agrees. “It is in fact today.”

“Smartass.”

Dick feels the pull of a smile and glances away. 

“I _meant_ ,” Jason continues, “are you gonna be okay? With this case?”

He thinks about it.

He could deflect and ask what Jason was talking about. That would probably piss him off, and they’re having a nice night, so-- no. He could lie and say he’ll be fine, but Jason knows him too well to believe that, and then they’d be back to square one. 

“I don’t know,” he says, and it feels strange to be honest. 

“S’alright,” Jason says. “I think what I meant to say anyway was, will you _know_ if you’re not okay?”

“I haven’t been okay in a long time.”

“Less okay. You know what I fuckin mean. How will you know if you gotta pull back?”

The concept of pulling back from something for his own emotional protection-- how the hell does that fit into their life? He’s aware of the idea, intellectually, and he’s even practiced it on a small scale, with things that can be avoided, but never in his role as Nightwing. It’s just not tenable.

The entire point of being a hero is to save people. Saving oneself is peripheral, even more so when it’s just from frights and nightmares. 

“I… don’t know that either.”

“Then think about it,” Jason says. “Things are fucked up for you right now. They don’t need to get worse.”

“I’m an adult. I won’t let my _issues_ get in the way of the investigation.”

“I don’t care about the _case_ , you dumb fuck. We can take care of that. I’m talking about _you._ ”

“I’ll keep an eye on it,” he says, and he knows that even if he doesn’t pay attention to how he’s doing, the others most definitely will. At the first sign of him being _upset_ , or _affected_ , or in any way touched by what’s an objectively disturbing case to begin with, they’ll all start with their own ways of trying to coddle him. 

Who wouldn’t be upset by something like this? Children taken and used and discarded, tossed aside into empty places, wrapped up in tarps to obscure their awful fates.

“It’s weird to think about, y’know,” Jason says, apparently taking him at his word. “I coulda been one of ‘em.” 

Dick tries to picture a teenaged Jason, leaning against a streetlamp in one of Gotham’s filthiest districts, wearing torn jeans and a tight shirt, chatting with the men who pulled up on the curb to see him, men who bore shark smiles and dark intentions. The roughness of Jason’s demeanor, the lack of pretension and how he called everything exactly what it was-- maybe that would have been attractive, to men like that, men who only wanted a fuck, and who were willing to pay to get it.

Dick’s never been _paid_. In cash, anyway. In terms of information, and access to areas and people, and blending into a crowd-- yes. And of course he'd never explicitly laid down sex as a trade for information-- that was begging for bad intel, and plainly against the idea of staying undercover. 

Yes, he's gotten a lot through the power of sex, and how people view his body, but not money. 

He’d grown up simply, but he’d never lacked the essentials, and by the time he was eight, he had become the adopted son of one of the richest men in the entire world. He’s never known such financial hardship that it would have become necessary to do such a thing-- but maybe that’s worse. He’s not ever been pushed that hard, up to the final edge of desperation, and yet he’s still done so. much. and for so. many. people.

“Did you ever do--”

The first few words are out of his mouth before he can muster enough tact to stop them, and Jason cuts him a harsh glance and says, “No.”

“... I’m glad.”

He is. He doesn’t know how else to say it. 

“Yeah,” Jason says. “I was a shady little shit, but I stayed out of drugs, and that’s what gets them turning tricks nine times out of ten.” 

Why had he even asked? Such a sensitive topic, one Dick couldn’t discuss about his own self without major impediment, and here he is blurting out questions to Jason with no sense of how it might be taken.

He’s an idiot.

“Take that stupid look off your face,” Jason says. “If it makes you feel better, I never got the ‘bad touch’. I punched the fuck out of every adult that got within creeping distance of me.” 

“ _Good_ ,” Dick says. He can’t imagine Jason being like him-- acquiescing and doing what he’s told and moving his body to make it easier. Less painful for him. Even if he didn’t voice his surrender, his body still did it for him. 

"Although Willis had this cousin who always looked at me funny, gave me these weird long hugs. Gave me a bad feeling." 

Dick looks back at him. Jason’s legs are still crossed on the couch, knees hanging off the edge because of his height, and he’s twirling around the straw from his empty drink. He doesn’t look dazed, as if he’s recalling something traumatic. Rather, he seems like he’s just… _being_. 

“Actually,” he says, after that pause, “now that I think about it, he was probably dry humping me. But whatever. One day he'd had some major thing at the dentist’s office and I punched him in the jaw as he was grabbing me. Fucker never tried that again." 

“That’s awful,” Dick says, because it is. But somehow saying that doesn’t seem to be even remotely enough. 

“Yeah, so then he tried to beat the fuck out of _me_ , but my dad was in the room. Funnily enough he never cared about the other shit, but it was like he’d decided that only _he_ got to hit me.” 

Dick tries to imagine it. He doesn’t remember his parents _very_ well, just that they'd loved Dick with all their hearts. Mary was a lantern in the window of their little world, shining to collect all weary folk at the day's end, consistent and serving as a guidepost to show the way home where love and comfort abounded. John, by contrast, was a crackling electric light, arcing from conduit to conduit with enthusiasm and energy, so bright he left stars in others’ eyes. 

On optimistic days, Dick likes to think he got the best of both of them. 

They were so… _good_. Idyllic, really, almost to the point of being a cliché. If he were to watch a movie that featured a set of parents like his, he’d scoff and say that it never actually happened that way. But it had, for him.

Living in a circus trailer wasn’t conducive to having actual pets, so they improvised. They'd take Dick out into the grass with a glass jar to hunt crickets to keep for the day, and if they found a creek they'd turn over stones to show him the way the crawdads flipped their tails and burrowed in the sand. They made sure to explain that the crickets had their own homes to return to at the end of the day, and that the crawdads needed to be covered (gently) back up so they could keep living their crustacean lives. That love and care, so gentle and encompassing, for all creatures and people and things-- that's what his parents taught him. 

And oh, how they found happiness in the tiniest things. When they went for walks John held one of his hands and Mary held the other. Then every so often they'd coordinate and swing him into the air, and he always thought it was so amazing-- even better than being on the trapeze. Mary sometimes tickled him awake in the mornings and he'd laugh so hard that John would pick him up so he could catch his breath. And then, at night, they'd fall asleep together making shadow puppets on the walls of the little trailer they called home. 

All those moments, more rare and precious than diamonds, are collected in a battered shoebox in his head, not forgotten but sometimes pushed away to keep them from the world's pollution. They glisten when he pulls them out to inspect them, spinning in the air like crystal ornaments. They gather and refract what little light might exist in that dusty corner of his mind, enough for him to see clearly, so that he can pack them up again. That's the beauty-- even in death, John and Mary love him enough to let themselves be tucked away. 

They hadn’t had much in the way of material things, their little family of three, but in the face of everything else they shared, it seemed inconsequential. 

When Bruce came along, he was like a furnace, kept deep in a basement and hidden away, yet powering along so many many things, with a strength and dedication that most never saw. He was Brucie Wayne, an idiot who’d inherited a bunch of money from his tragically dead parents, and who was clueless about the more realistic manners of life, but who happened to have good people to run his business and kept his nose cleaner than the rest of the Gotham socialites. He hardly ever got _bad_ press, but none of it ever revealed who he was, either. The world felt the warmth of his presence but never connected it to the iron beast in the bottom of the building. This was by his own design, but it still-- it still wasn’t _fair_.

The world would never know how much they owed to Bruce, and to Batman, and to all the things he’d helped fund and found. 

Dick’s not dumb. Compared to Tim, he might as well be a potato, but he’s not dumb. He’d done well in school, especially in math and science, and he still remembers his physics. 

Light is produced from the excitation of electrons as they jump from orbit to orbit of the atomic shell. When they drop down to their original orbit, the excess energy is released in the form of light. The more efficient the light source, the less heat produced, and the less energy needed. That’s why Alfred had been an early adopter of fluorescent light bulbs; Dick had made fun of their strange shape but eventually grown to like the way they made the lampshades wobble just a bit, and now-- the manor is lit with bright LEDs in every room, the futuristic aspect clashing quietly with the home’s historic nature.

And it’s like that with the family. He’s never thought of it in this way before, but--

Bruce, so hidden, with emotions behind a cast iron door. Too hot to touch, even for a second, but keeping an entire home warm from a safe distance. Tim would be a flashlight, with focusing lenses and a beam that shot through the sky until it hit the clouds, precise and cutting swathes through the darkness. Damian-- he doesn’t know yet. Damian is still young, and forming, and it’s amazing to watch his personality develop day by day. Dick hopes he’ll grow to have the best of all of them, too, the way he hopes he’s like his own parents. 

And Jason.

Jason is… indescribable. 

Maybe he’d be a welding torch. Light so bright it could, and would, blind, and a heat that melded solid metal together, powered by a substance so explosive it had to be kept carefully stored away. 

Yes. 

So capable, so important, but also-- dangerous above all.

“Hey Dickaroni,” Jason says, and Dick comes back from his thoughts to see Jason stabbing the straw in his general direction. 

“... What?”

“I’m starting the next episode. Pay fucking attention because we’re _not_ rewinding if you miss something important.” 

“We never get rewinds,” he says, and Jason gives him a funny look, like he doesn’t speak the language of crypticism that’s become so natural to Dick recently. 

“We _do_ ,” Jason replies, “just not fuckin tonight.” 

* * *

“You’ve lost ten pounds,” is the first issue Leslie brings up during their examination the following Monday. 

“Summertime’s coming up. Gotta make sure I’ve got that beach body.” 

“Dick,” she says.

She’s known him since he was eight years old. It trips him out sometimes. Along with Bruce and Alfred and Jim, she’s been one of the most constant adult figures in his life, even if he only sees her when he or another family member is seriously injured. It’s not like that’s infrequent, but recently, it’s been solely because of him.

And because she’s known him for so long, she also knows exactly what to say and how to say it. Rather than reprimanding him for his sarcasm, or fighting against it, she just says his name, and waits.

He can’t deal with her the same way he would Bruce or even Alfred. He’d feel too guilty. 

So he looks at her and says, “I can’t eat.” 

He leaves it at that. She can put together the rest.

“I’m going to go over some questions that I have to ask,” she says. “Bear with me.” 

“Okay,” he says, but really he thinks he should ask her to bear with _him_. It can’t be easy, watching him do this fuckery to himself and still having to pretend to be professional. 

“Are you uncomfortable with your appearance or weight?” 

The burn is almost entirely faded. There’s just a faint spot on his cheekbone, no bigger than a dime, and barely discolored. And that’s… not what she’s talking about.

“No,” he says. “That’s never really-- been a consideration. For me, anyway.” 

And it hasn’t been, except in the way that it’s affected other people. He’s never looked in the mirror and preened, and he’s only ever assessed himself in terms of how easily he can pick up someone for information. That hasn’t ever been hard; it sounds vain but it’s true. Aside from general attractiveness, his toned and defined body is just a side effect of what he _does_ ; form follows function. Other people strive for fitness as an end to itself but for him, and the rest of the family, it's a prerequisite for everything they do. 

Leslie knows that. He knows she knows that.

He also knows that this is a screening question for eating disorders. 

“Do you limit your food intake intentionally?” 

“Kind of,” he says. “Just because-- it feels like I’ll throw up, if I try. So I don’t.” 

"And it isn't related to how you see yourself, or your weight?" 

"I just feel sick when I think about it. That's the reason I don't." 

“... Do you mind if I use the word ‘trauma’?” 

“You just did,” he says.

“I’m not applying it to you yet.” 

“I know I’ve been through ‘trauma’,” he says, putting it in his best sarcastic voice. “Everyone seems _really_ keen to remind me of that.” 

“I’ll leave it to you to think about,” she says, “but I’d like you to be aware that with flare-ups of trauma, psychosomatic effects often also occur. I don’t think you have an eating disorder per se; it’s most likely related to all that’s been brought up recently.” 

“Already knew that,” he sings under his breath. 

She doesn’t say anything to that. He’s glad; it was disrespectful of him.

“You’ve experienced similar things in the past,” she says, “and you’ve worked through it.” 

“I know,” he says. 

“You haven’t always felt like this.” 

“Still,” he says, “I don’t think I can go back to how I was before this all happened.”

And that’s the crux of it, isn’t it. 

What he’d done before-- that’d been easy. His persona is a bit of an airhead, affectionate and cheery and excitable, seeming to never hide his emotions or consider the cost of expressing them in the moment they’re felt. And if things ever got a little bad-- well, that was easy to cover up, too. Pretend to be emotional over something more acceptable. It wasn’t difficult to channel his feelings through conduits and morph them into another appearance entirely. He wasn’t crying over seeing the fucking stars and remembering how much he’d longed to escape to them all those years ago; he was doing it because he’d watched Fried Green Tomatoes earlier and it was just _so_ heartbreaking. 

People bought it, because he was Dick Grayson, and he was sensitive, and heartfelt, and he always spoke his mind about feelings-- right?

“Can I use some medical terminology that you might find objectionable?” 

“Won’t bother me,” he says, and he wishes that were the truth. 

“I think you have PTSD,” she says. “I think you’ve had it for a long time.” 

He stiffens just at hearing the acronym. It sounds so melodramatic. And he’d had coworkers at the police department who’d developed it from a shootout or a particularly bad case, and he knows it’s something soldiers get, and rape victims, but--

They’re not him.

“Complex PTSD,” she elaborates, when he doesn’t say anything. “The DSM doesn’t recognize it, which I disagree with, but the psychological community as a whole agrees that C-PTSD is a different constellation of circumstances and symptoms.” 

“I know what it is,” he says. “I had to learn it about it when I was in officer training.”

“I’m surprised that they covered it. Most laypersons don’t know the distinction.” 

“It was mentioned in part of our course for kidnapping victims,” he says. “And children in long-term abuse situations.” 

“Of course,” she says. “Those are two of the most common demographics in which it occurs, along with prisoners of war and defecting members of cults.” 

He’s aware that some people would say all four apply to him. Kidnapping-- obvious. Long-term abuse-- also obvious, although three months isn’t really… _long-term_ … in his opinion. Prisoners of war? Bruce had raised them all to be soldiers, and it had been in dedication of what the more critical members of the media called “the personality cult of Batman”. 

He’s sure that she’s thinking it to herself right now. She wouldn’t have mentioned it if she weren’t. 

“I don’t have it,” he says finally. “I can see how you’d think that, but I don’t have it.” 

“What don’t you have?” 

“ _That_.” 

“Can you say it?” 

If it’s in relation to him, then no, he can’t. He really can’t. It’s as if it’s glued to his tongue.

“No,” he says, “but I don’t have it.”

“Alright,” she says. “We don’t have to go into it any more. I felt the need to mention it, just to cover the bases, but--”

“I don’t _have it_ ,” he repeats. 

“Alright,” she says again. “Alright.” 

She does another set of x-rays on his foot, and points out where the bony callus is developing on the two metatarsals that are healing.

“I think gentle exercise and movement will help you at this point,” she says. “I’m clearing you for _light_ duty. That means none of your usual shtick.” 

“Good,” he says, “because… I went out with Bruce already.” 

Her face ripples with disapproval. 

“Not anything athletic,” he clarifies quickly. “Just to meet Commissioner Gordon.” 

“I’m choosing to believe you.” 

She sounds like Alfred always had when he’d asked Dick if he’d cleaned his room, all the while knowing that there were some stray clothes hidden under the bed and toys stuffed into the closet. 

“I promise,” he says. “Do you think Bruce would let me do anything more? Lately he’s been even more overprotective than he normally is.” 

She doesn’t say anything until she’s pulled her windbreaker out of her travel bag and put it on. She’s getting ready to face the mist outside-- a sign that their appointment is almost done. 

“When we love people, and feel out of control, our care can morph into what’s seen as overprotection.” 

“God,” he says, “don’t I know it.” 

“It's tough, Dick, seeing the people we love suffer. Try to eat as much as you can." 

"I told you, I'll throw up if I do."

"Take promethazine or ondansetron before eating,” she says. “I know you have plenty in stock in the Cave, but I’m giving you new prescriptions for both.” 

He wonders why he hadn’t thought of taking something for the nausea before this. She’s right; the Cave has an extensive stockpile of medications, probably more than most clinics. But still-- it hadn’t occurred to him. 

Maybe because he hadn’t wanted to fix it. Maybe because he hadn’t cared. Maybe because someone would have noticed him trying to alleviate it, and that was worse than denying it in the first place. 

She ushers him out of the exam room, flicking the light off as they leave, and he figures he’ll have to fill the prescriptions. Leslie has a seemingly psychic ability to know when they don't. 

And-- 

If he has his own supply, then no one will know how sick he feels, either, or how often he might end up taking them. It’s the best solution to everything, he thinks, and again, he’s so grateful to her, the way she looks out for his privacy.

She gives him a hug before she leaves, rubbing his back between the shoulder blades like his mother used to do, and that sympathetic touch, so close and warm and without needless explanation--

It makes him feel better. He’s never had it offered limitlessly and without reservation, not since his parents died. Bruce isn’t tactile, and neither is Damian, and besides them he’s only ever really been touched by-- people with _other_ motives. Bruce has been making more effort to touch him recently, and sometimes Damian deigns to let Dick hug him, but this sort of unbridled comfort, from someone else _to_ him…

It’s nice.

“Take care of yourself,” she says. “For your own sake. You deserve it.”

Then, with a rustle of her windbreaker and the clack of her practical low boots on the floor, she’s gone.

Dick still feels the warmth.

* * *

Later that afternoon, Dick thinks of what Leslie had said: loving someone so much that it morphs into outright fear.

He thinks he understands what she’d meant. 

Bruce is the father he’s had for most of his life, and, though it feels traitorous to say, the most influential. It’s the nature of it. He’d been barely old enough to form lasting memories and connections when his parents died, and Bruce had swept in quickly enough that the attachment went straight to him. 

Young Bruce, new father Bruce, had been-- different. 

In the civilian world, Bruce had carefully screened each and every person he interacted with. He hadn’t realized it at the time, but his introduction to society had been controlled and metered, not so much to avoid publicity but to protect him. And when Dick finally did make it out in public, Bruce had _hovered_ , even at events where he was supposed to be connecting with other important members of the Gotham social sphere. Dick as a child had been grateful, because hiding behind Bruce in that sort of crowd was so comforting, but in retrospect, it was… a bit excessive. 

As he got older it had become frustrating, but the result was that Dick had never, as _himself_ , been around anyone who could be deemed even slightly unsavory. Wally-- his first actual friend, the first one who knew both aspects of his life-- had experienced the scrutiny firsthand. Bruce had taken him to the side and spoken to him for almost two hours straight before he’d allowed him into the Manor, and, thus, Dick’s ‘real’ life. Dick had timed it and even eavesdropped by the door a little. 

“You’re older,” Bruce had said. “Two years older.” 

Wally had been twelve at the time.

“Yes, sir, Mr. Wayne, sir, I am.” 

Somehow, knowing Batman’s true identity had made Wally even _more_ intimidated by him. His voice cracked a little on the second ‘sir’. 

“Because you are older, you may feel the need to expose him to… _things_.” Bruce’s voice dripped with disdain.

“Um, no, sir, nothing like that--” 

“I will know if you do, and the consequences will astound you.” 

Dick remembers that he snickered at that, because Bruce had never spoken to him with even a tenth that level of seriousness and foreboding, and hearing it being directed at Wally, so silly and irreverent, was hilarious. At least, at the time.

“Dude,” Wally had said to him, when he was finally set free, “he is _crazily_ overprotective.” 

“He cares about me,” Dick shrugged. “I’m his only son.” 

It had seemed perfectly normal to him-- at least in his life as Dick Grayson.

As for being Robin, that was something else entirely. It was as if Bruce’s mentality split evenly down the middle, with no communication from one side to the other. To come over to Dick’s house, _Wally_ got the platonic equivalent of the ‘don’t touch my daughter’ speech given by a thousand fathers on prom night. Meanwhile, _Robin_ could go out with _Kid Flash_ and fight psychopaths who held no hesitation about harming children. 

That kind of overprotectiveness just isn’t logical when combined with what he’d allowed Dick to do as Robin. Not just _allowed_. Encouraged. Supported.

Of course he’s known it. It’s not like it’s a hard juxtaposition to capture. But, in the face of Jason’s tales, and this new case, and everything that’s been brought up for him--

How is it any different from a normal parent who allows their children to be exposed to fear, and danger, and harm? Is a fancy suit and some martial arts training and a cohort of crime-fighting peers supposed to mitigate all that? 

He thinks of Damian, and how unnatural it is for a child to be raised with that level of… violent impulse. But he was trained to be that way. He’d never had a choice. In a different way, neither had Jason. They’d been surrounded by it from the start. Admittedly, Damian has never known anything but a luxurious existence, free of want and deprivation, and no doubt Talia had kept him even more carefully isolated than Bruce had kept Dick. 

But nobody had taught and raised and nurtured Jason into being a fighter, or a killer. No one had stood by his side and whispered compliments when he did something correctly, or offered hints when he needed improvement. He’d learned everything he needed to know by scrabbling with bare hands, blood on the asphalt as he got again and again to his feet. Fighting wasn’t something he kept partitioned to one side; it was part of him. It was what had kept him alive, and no one could or should criticize that deeply protective adaptation. 

Bruce had seen Jason, seen those reflexes and inclinations, and thought that he needed to be molded. He’s said as much, a dozen times, mentioning the bravery that it must have taken to steal the rims off the Batmobile, and how much mental fortitude Jason must have had to survive alone as long as he did.

He’d taken Jason on as a ward and a project, but never as a son. Jason probably wouldn’t have accepted it anyway, with how his own parents had been and his terrible experiences in general, but Bruce hadn’t really… tried.

Tim-- that had been because the kid just never stopped insisting and there was no other way to get rid of him. Apprentice, maybe, but Tim already had parents, ones he’d grown up with and remembered clearly, even if they weren’t affectionate or loving. 

And Damian-- well.

It’s not _Bruce_ ’s fault that there’s a lack of emotional connection between them. No one should be forced to deal with a constant reminder of their rape unless they chose it. Bruce hadn’t even been aware of it until ten years after the fact, which Dick thought must have been more of a shock. To recover, enough to seem as though nothing has changed, and then to be reminded of it with such existential firmness...

Dick had told Damian that he’d love him just as much if he were his own child, and had come about that way, and he thinks that’s true. He can’t imagine loving the boy any less than he does now.

But he’s not Bruce, and he hasn’t actually been put in that situation. So. In light of everything--

He finds he’s judging less and less, even as his love for Damian feels ever more like drowning.

He had chosen Damian to be Robin, even knowing the horrors it could entail, how dangerous it could be, what had happened to him and Jason. He can’t criticize Bruce for doing something he himself had found appropriate.

If he does, it means he condemns himself too, and everything that Damian loves.

Still. This case. He can’t allow Damian to work on it. He’s considered it over and over in the past few days and-- no. It just can’t happen.

Predictably, the boy isn’t happy to hear it.

“This is absurd,” Damian says when Dick breaks the news to him. His RP accent is suddenly strong, always a sure sign that he’s getting mad. 

“Dami,” he says. “Try to see it from my point of view. There are _dead_ _children_ , and god only knows who the fucker is who’s doing it, and you, you’re--”

He’s going to cry.

Fuck it.

He really is going to cry in front of him. Again.

“I love you, Dami. And I just--” 

A shiver runs from the top of his head, then down his spine and arms. He still can’t think about it. It’s too much.

“So many things could happen to you.”

At the sight of his tears, Damian’s temper seems to have tapered down. 

“It has always been thus,” the boy says, sounding so old.

“Yeah,” Dick sniffs. Damian has pulled tissues out of _somewhere_ and he takes one. “Yeah, it has. And it’s fucked up.” 

“... You have been cursing more as of late.”

He has.

He’s not proud of it-- he can’t remember John and Mary ever cussing in front of him. And Bruce-- Bruce has done it so rarely that it’s strange to even think about those sorts of words coming from his mouth. Even when he and Jason have their biggest fights, he refrains from it. Jason insists it’s just so that Bruce can feel like he has the moral high ground. But it’s also-- it also is really a reflection of how someone is raised. Maybe that’s old-fashioned of him to think, but…

“It’s not a good example,” Dick admits. “Don’t follow it.” 

“I could hardly care less about foul language. I find it to be trivial when compared to the other matters with which we deal.” 

And there it is again.

“You shouldn’t have to deal with it,” he says. “I want so much more for you. You shouldn’t-- this life, Dami, you didn’t get a _choice_ \--” 

“Richard,” Damian says. “You are surely aware that none of us have had much choice.” 

It’s so true, and so sad.

“Can you humor me? Just this once?”

“I suppose,” he sighs. “Final exams are approaching at the academy, and I may use the extra time to study.” 

Damian does well in school. His private tutors had excelled in his education before he’d come to Gotham. Gotham Academy is an advanced school with a rigorous curriculum, but still, it’s a breeze for someone like him. Studying isn’t something he has to do. 

He’s grateful that Damian will give him that excuse, though. It makes him feel less like he’s demanding something, and more as if it’s a negotiation. 

“This won’t be for every case,” he says. It can’t be, even if some part of him, right now, wants to uproot the both of them from Gotham and move to a place where the biggest problem is cattle wandering out in front of cars.

Damian tugs at his shirt sleeve. 

“This conversation is over," he says. "May we get ice cream now?” 

Dick laughs.

The transition, so abrupt, so formal, so _Damian_. 

“Sure,” he says. “But you have to pick something other than mint this time.” 

“Mint is reinvigorating,” Damian pouts. “It possesses refreshing properties.” 

Maybe that’s true for Damian, but this-- this here, this child and this relationship, this love that he’ll give without end--

That’s reinvigorating, for _him_. 

* * *

“Spar with me,” Dick says to Jason, when he’s over at the manor a couple of days later to review the case.

Jason looks him up and down, a quizzical and confused expression on his face as if Dick’s just asked him why water is wet. 

“I need to practice, if I’m going to be back in the field.”

“You’re not supposed to be fighting,” Jason says. “This is just investigative work.”

“I know, but if things get hairy, I don’t need to be out of shape.” 

Jason stuffs a slice of Alfred’s spice bread into his mouth. He chews mulishly, still looking at Dick as if he’s an idiot for even suggesting it. Dick continues, feeling an irrational need to explain further.

“Bruce will treat me like I’m made of glass if I ask him, and Tim--” 

It sounds like an arrogant thing to say, but he can still roundly kick Tim’s ass, and Damian’s, even if he’s not functioning at full capacity. Jason… is more of a challenge. They haven’t fought in complete seriousness, tooth and nail, for years, and he doubts they ever will again, but he remembers how difficult it had been to hold his own, and how impressed he’d been, despite himself, at Jason’s progress.

“Right,” Jason says, once he’s swallowed. “Gotcha.” 

They head down to the Cave and dress in workout clothing. Jason hasn’t been around regularly for _forever_ , but Alfred still keeps stuff his size in stock. It’s so thoughtful. He imagines that Alfred had always known Jason would come back eventually.

“I’m not going to come at you all the way,” Jason tells him once they’re on the mat.

“God, don’t pull a Bruce on me.”

“Don’t compare me to that asshole,” he says, without heat. “I just don’t want to be responsible for fucking you up while you’re in the process of healing.”

“As if you could,” Dick goads, and Jason sighs, shaking his head before squaring up. 

Dick moves first. He comes at Jason with a roundhouse kick at the torso, which Jason deflects with his forearm. He’s balancing on his injured foot, and he feels damn unstable when he tries to redirect that energy back into a crescent kick. Jason ducks it, and he transitions to his other foot, trying one last time to get him with a knee.

Jason’s backed away out of range, just a couple of steps, and it’s _frustrating_. Why is he so slow right now? Why is Jason avoiding everything so easily? Is he really that dependent on being able to zip his way around enemies, keep them befuddled and wondering where he is?

He lashes out with a front kick, which Jason _also_ dodges, and then he moves forward with a right jab to the face. Jason pivots and slaps his hand away, but that’s okay, because when Jason strikes back, he grabs his arm and twists it, trying to force it into a joint lock. Jason responds by pulling in the opposite direction while thrusting out at Dick’s grasp with his other arm. Dick follows him aggressively, with a right cross this time. Jason deflects that too, then follows up with an openhanded slap to the side of Dick’s face.

Slaps hurt. They get depicted as things girls do to each other in petty school fights, but with the right momentum, and the right aim-- ouch.

He knows Jason is going easy on him though, which makes sense, since they’re just sparring, and lightly at that, and he’s injured and off his game. It still pisses him off. 

His stance isn’t steady enough to take the strike. He uses the momentum to flip swiftly backwards and get some space, but again, his damn _foot_ keeps making decisions for him. He stumbles a little as he lands back on his feet, and then Jason is right there with him, throwing him onto the floor.

Don’t let them take you to the ground. 

That’s lesson number one for anyone who’s not a trained grappler, and even more for someone like him, whose strength is mobility and, quite literally, being _off_ the ground.

“Kicking wasn’t the smartest choice,” Jason pants out once he’s got him pinned. They’re breathing hard already.

Fiction always makes fights seem so _long_ , when in reality they rarely last more than a few seconds, all explosive energy and blitzing choices. Most confrontations get decided in the first few moves-- if it were for real, Jason would use this chance to pound his face in with enough force to stun him completely, if not knock him out. Or-- if it were for _real_ for real, even kill him. 

But it’s not for real, and he knows Jason won’t hurt him like that, so in spite of the position, and its potential for complete destruction, he lets himself go limp and says, “You win this one.”

“Nah, didn’t notice,” Jason says, standing and lending Dick a hand to help him up. 

“Don’t be smug.”

He means it as a quick comeback, but somehow a bit of his anger at himself comes through.

“Hey,” Jason says, “don’t feel bad. Remember all the times you kicked my ass up and down this fuckin room?”

“I do,” he says. There had been… a _lot_ of times that happened. He also remembers how Jason never stopped getting up, or begging for another round, no matter how soundly he’d been put onto the mat or how thoroughly Dick had danced around him. 

“I was so frustrated,” he says. “It seemed like I couldn’t get a hit on you, no matter what. You were untouchable.”

“I really wasn’t,” Dick muses, “and I’m _definitely_ not now.”

Jason had been a fast learner, before he’d gotten killed, and when he’d come back, he’d been motivated by something else entirely, something that accelerated his progress into the machine Dick had fought while Bruce was gone.

“Go again?” he says, to buffer whatever response might come to that. “Best two out of three.”

He loses the next match too, and when he gasps out, “Best three out of five,” Jason agrees again. 

Four rounds and he loses three. There’s one that might be considered a draw, if he’s being favorable to himself. 

“So,” Jason says at the end, when they’re cooling off in the lounge area, “I think that means you need to stay the fuck out of fights until your foot’s healed, _just like I told you_.”

“I wouldn’t lose in the field,” he says. “Most people aren’t at your level.”

“I’ll take that as a much-deserved compliment,” Jason says airily, but without actual feeling. Dick knows that way of responding to positive things-- brushing them off without denying them, but also without accepting them. 

“... I feel even more useless now that I _know_ I’m shit.”

Jason’s guzzled half the Brita pitcher of water, the one Damian had insisted on instead of plastic bottles because of microplastics in the ocean. 

“Jesus,” Jason says, shoving the pitcher at Dick, who refills his own glass. “Like you said, most people still wouldn’t be able to kick your ass. That’s why you didn’t want to fight the Replacement.”

“Tim,” Dick says.

“Fucking fine. That’s why you didn’t want to fight _Tim_.”

Jason hefts himself up off the couch, taking the pitcher back to be refilled. 

As he’s walking over to the sink, he says, “Just be _careful_ , and don’t go out on your own. Someone might get the jump on you, god forbid something happen."

"Would that be so horrible?" Dick says under his breath. He hadn’t meant for Jason to hear it but--

Jason spins around, rigid from head to toe, arms tense and fists clenched. He almost drops the pitcher.

"Yes, it fucking _would be_ , asshole, if not for you then everyone else."

"I didn't mean--" 

Dick falls short. He doesn't know what he'd meant. Does he want to die? No-- he hasn't thought about it seriously for years, and when he did, it had been when he was with Slade. 

But if someone were to be behind him, right now, with a gun inches from his skull, and if they pulled the trigger without him knowing and he just… stopped existing, then he doesn't think he'd mind it at all. 

"I don't give a fuck what you did or didn't mean," Jason says. "It doesn't matter. Either you were serious, in which case it's a problem, or you were joking, in which case it's also a problem."

"It's not like we've never joked about dying before," Dick offers up. It's a weak defense, one that Jason batters down immediately. 

"Yeah, we have, but not in _these circumstances_."

"... These circumstances?" 

Jason exhales very deliberately through his nose. 

"I'm not gonna play dumb. You know things are fucked up with you right now and you also know why saying shit like that isn't cool."

"I'm sorry," he says. It feels useless in the face of Jason's anger.

"I'm not mad at _you_ ," Jason replies, and the agitation flows out of his body until he looks like his statement is true. He sets the pitcher down into the fridge and closes the door before leaning against it, staring at Dick from a few feet away. 

"Then… what are you mad at?" 

"Fuck," he says, flexing his hands, "who the hell even knows any more."

His knuckles are red from the force of the punches, even through the protection of his gloves. Jason hits hard, the hardest out of all of them. He's got the body for it, thick muscle and long long reach. 

"I used to get mad at every _single_ fucking thing." 

"I remember," Dick says, and he does. Jason, fresh from the streets, had taken personal offense at even the most basic kindnesses-- Alfred making him cookies, Bruce buying him new clothes, Dick offering to show him around the Manor. He went from quiet to enraged in seconds, and Dick… had looked down at him for his reactivity. 

He feels ashamed about it, even years later, because he'd taken Jason's anger at face value and not bothered to delve beneath. Anyone from his situation would have been suspicious, and stubborn, and all the other things that he's hesitant to even think now because the words have such bad connotations, when in reality they were the only thing fueling the fire that kept Jason alive until Bruce found him. 

“I don’t even know why,” Jason continues. “It was just like-- anything and everything. And if it wasn’t anger, it was this… constant worry.”

“It was a big adjustment,” he says, which is the understatement of the fucking century. 

“Eh,” Jason says. “I remember being in awe when I came here. Washing machines, stoves, _food_ …”

“I’m sorry.” He feels like he can’t say that enough. 

“I think it’s why I’m so obsessive with my place, to be honest.” 

Jason _is_ a little obsessive, not that Dick would ever have mentioned it. He’s got his own issues, ones he’s grateful no one points out, and he’s willing to do Jason the same favor. 

But every place he’s ever lived is spotless, at all times. Not just in a practical way, when someone enjoys a clean house, but-- to the point of neuroticism. 

Even when Jason had been absolutely fucked up by the flu last fall, it had been pristine. No dirty clothes in the basket, no dishes in the sink. The first morning, when Jason had texted him with a simple, _Under the weather_ , he’d let himself in to find a feverish Jason stumbling around the house, cleaning the baseboards with melamine foam. Dick had hidden the cleaning supplies high in the closet and come back that evening to find Jason nearly passed out on the bathroom floor, kitchen sponge in his hand as he’d kept with the impossible task of making the baseboards even cleaner. 

Jason had given him a key, and he’d never asked for it back. Dick still has it. It’s… nice. He knows Jason hasn’t forgotten about it, and that trust-- he’ll never betray it.

“That makes sense,” he says, trying for neutrality. He thinks of how Leslie responded to him when he said things that might have qualified as personal revelations. No judgement, no assigning value one way or another. “Cleanliness is a perk of modern life.”

“Speaking of clean,” Jason says, “I need a fuckin shower. You coming?”

Dick follows him to the showers. There’s multiple, with individual shower stalls. Dick remembers a second being added when he’d come along, and then a third for Jason, and finally a fourth and fifth. It’s a waste of resources when all the full bathrooms upstairs get factored in-- most houses don’t even _have_ five showers in them, but those sorts of things didn’t occur to Bruce, or, if they did, he didn’t care. He’d never had to share much of anything, so the concept of sharing a shower stall must have seemed abhorrent to him. 

And Dick… well, he’s never been a self-conscious person, much less around his family. Right now, though, he’s grateful for the privacy. 

He turns the water on, hot enough to scald the already beginning soreness from his skin. And then he looks down at the scars from the wreck. 

They’re still there, the most numerous and notable he has. He gets questions about them sometimes, from… _people_ … who aren’t in the family. It’s convenient that they really are from a car wreck. He doesn’t know how he’d explain them otherwise. There’s only so many times he could get ‘caught up in a barbed wire fence’, or ‘mauled by a cat’, before people started getting suspicious. 

They’re-- a lot.

He knows Bruce hadn’t meant it to upset him, but that photo of him, the one where he’s in the kitchen and weighing out flour, showing the healing wounds from the glass he’d crawled through… 

That’s only made him think about it more, and he realizes just how much of them remain, even all these years later. 

Damian is Bruce’s reminder.

These scars-- these are one of his. 

The water in Jason’s stall turns off. 

“I’m going upstairs,” Jason calls. “Don’t turn into a damn prune.”

Dick doesn’t respond. He hears Jason leave. 

Scar tissue is stiff and unpliable. It’s technically still skin, but it’s a different composition of collagen. Sweat glands and hair follicles don’t grow in it; it’s permanently altered, and despite expectations, it’s weaker than what it’s replaced. 

People talk about scars a lot, usually hyperbolically or metaphorically. They say things like, _I’m scarred for life_ , or, _That experience scarred me_. 

But with him-- well. 

Even if he didn’t remember it in his mind every fucking day, it’s right here with him, on his body. He doesn’t understand how people can find him attractive when they see it, the evidence of all that sin, but somehow they do.

They don’t understand.

No one, it seems, understands. 

* * *

“I have a prize,” he announces when Damian gets home from school the next day. “A prize for you, and one for Alfred, and even one for Titus.” 

Damian hangs his bookbag onto the stair railing in the foyer and sits on the bench to remove his shoes. 

“We have not participated in a contest through which we might earn prizes,” he says, but Dick catches a little bit of excitement on his face regardless. This is what other people don’t see, the shy desire for love and affection hiding behind the walls built into him since childhood.

“You always win first place in my heart,” Dick says in a deliberately cheesy way, but it’s true. So true.

Damian just rolls his eyes, a little smile on his lips. “What, pray tell, are the ‘prizes’?” 

He feels like the parents who let their children open the Christmas presents before telling them that Santa isn’t real.

They have to have a talk, but that doesn’t mean he can’t make Damian happy before it. 

“You have to guess first.” 

No one had ever played this game with Damian before him, but guessing is one of the obligatory parts of getting a present. The person receiving gets three attempts, and they have to actually _try_ to guess correctly. He’d felt strange, having to explain these rules to Damian the first time he’d gotten him a little something, but now-- Damian’s a professional.

Damian rattles off a gourmet brand of chocolate, new drawing supplies, and a pint of his favorite ice cream from the local shop. 

“No,” Dick says, “even better.” 

It’s ‘just’ a journal. But it’s a themed one, with a corresponding copy for the person who’s giving it. The intention is to fill them out as completely as can be comfortably accomplished, and then trade them so that each party can see what the other has said. 

It’s not deep, and it’s not hard work. It has questions like: _If you were a unicorn, what color would you be and why?_ ; _You open your cereal one day and it talks to you-- what does it say?_ ; and, _If you woke up tomorrow with four legs and no arms, how would your life change?_

Simple things. Things Damian has too much ‘dignity’ to talk about. The book had reminded him of all the silly conversations he’d had with Mary and John, and even with Bruce in the early years. Wondering if turtles consider all the other turtles in the pond to be roommates, and what personality each element of the periodic table would have if they were people. 

“We don’t get to talk a lot,” Dick says. “Or-- maybe we talk about the wrong things. But I thought that with this, we could… talk even when we’re not together.” 

Damian flips through it. He’s smiling more, but he’s still trying not to show it.

“‘ _What’_ ,” he reads, “‘ _do you consider to be the ugliest hairstyle in history, and why?_ ’” 

Dick saw that one. He’d privately thought it was the Vulcan haircut from Star Trek. 

“Thank you,” he says, after he’s read a few more of the prompts. “I will endeavor to complete it quickly.” He looks at Dick, eyes expectant. “I know that you shall finish yours quickly, as well.” 

“Of course,” Dick says, and he’s grinning now.

For Alfred (the cat) he bought a giant tub of ‘Kitty Kush’, apparently the latest and greatest variety of catnip. He assumes it’s good quality because it’s all buds; if he were still a cop and came across it sealed away in a baggie, he’d think it was some kind of primo weed. It came with a little grinder, too, with a cat’s paw imprinted on it.

(... Dick wonders if he should explain to Alfred that it’s definitely not for drugs.)

Titus gets a bag of cow hooves, which always disgust the rest of the family. 

“It’s not even a bone,” Tim had said once. “He’s chewing _cow toenails_ in our living room.”

“Aren’t you glad you’re not a dog,” Dick had replied. They’d had barbeque ribs that night, so it seemed only appropriate to follow up with, “You get to chew on _pig rib cages_ instead.”

They go up to Damian’s room, where the animals are both sleeping. It must be nice to be a housecat, he thinks. Lazing around all day, getting pets and treats without doing anything for them, sleeping at leisure and clawing up everything in sight without repercussion…

The cat in question wakes up when Damian calls him, and then _truly_ wakes up when some of the catnip gets sprinkled on the floor. Damian chucks a cow hoof in Titus’s corner, and the dog begins to chew it, slobber rapidly saturating his dog bed. 

“So,” he says, sitting on one of Damian’s enormous floor pillows, “I’m glad you like your present. And that the animals like theirs.”

Damian surveys him. 

“You are using the tone normally employed when you feel the need to ‘parent’ me,” he observes. 

God. He really, _really_ is turning into Bruce. He’d used to make fun of him for his ‘dad voice’, but now-- Damian’s right. He’s using it himself, without realizing it.

“Yeah,” he says, “I am. You’re gonna have to put up with it. Sorry, Dami.”

Damian drags another floor pillow over, and sits down across from him. 

“Commence your wisdom,” Damian says.

He’s just got to go for it. There’s no easing into this subject, and Damian won’t appreciate it anyway. He calls it ‘politician talk’, and disdains it when he sees Bruce doing it on TV.

"You know the gist of what Slade did to me." 

Damian's nod is short, sharp. 

That part’s out, the worst part, but there’s a need to clarify. Slade did a lot of things to him. And if it feels awful-- well. 

"Sexually, I mean."

Damian nods again. 

He hates it, but he's going to have to push through it. 

"Has anyone… ever talked to you about sex, and what it means?"

"I am fully aware of the definition of sexual activity, Richard." 

"Not that. I know you know. I'm talking more… about in regards to you personally."

If Damian were a regular boy, he'd be embarrassed to death, but he's not, and he simply looks as though he's humoring Dick by allowing him to speak of this. 

"God," Dick says, "I know this is awkward. But given what’s happened-- and this case-- I thought I should just--"

Damian will be 13 in August. It’s nearing May now. 

"I find the idea of such close physical relations to be entirely repugnant."

Dick does too. But he can't say that. He can't let his own experiences color what Damian might come to think about himself, and what he might want or not want to… do… in the future. The far, far, _far_ away future. 

He's only twelve right now. Thirteen soon, sure, but-- 

Dick had been barely fourteen. Birthday in March, captured in May. 

Jesus fucking Christ.

"Whatever it is," he says, surprised at how level he's able to keep his voice, "it has to be _your_ choice. And…"

This is hard. How is he supposed to describe something that he himself has never experienced?

He remembers Jason's words, the night they'd watched Desperate Housewives for the first time. 

"And," he says, "sometimes it might feel nice, and other times it might be awkward, but no one should _ever_ do it unless they want to, and they feel comfortable, and safe, and trust the other person. And if someone does try it, when you don’t want it, I don’t care what you have to do, but _get away_ and tell someone.”

“Is that the case?” Damian asks, and Dick’s heart plummets for a second before he continues with, “Mother drilled into me that I was to remove the hand of any person who might touch me without my express permission.”

“You can do that too,” Dick says, not even caring that Damian might follow that to the letter. “I mean, if they try it-- _that_ way. Or to kidnap you. Or whatever. The point is, what you do with your body is _your choice_. And anyone who does something with you, they’ve got to be on the same page as you.”

“I understand,” Damian says. “One might compare it to sparring.” 

He… guesses? 

“Not sure I’m following, Dami.” 

Damian’s playing with Alfred’s paws now. The cat’s paw pads look like little fuzzy teddy bears. He bats them back and forth, following Damian’s hands, but not using his claws. He has a crazed look on his face, probably residual from the catnip. 

“Both participants must agree on it,” Damian says, “and they confirm rules beforehand. There are also established procedures for one party needing to end the match prematurely, and afterward, each takes the time to thank the other. It’s a mutually beneficial arrangement for the improvement of both involved. They also feature close physical contact and the potential for injury, and, when one-sided, they are actively harmful and constitute a crime.”

“Right,” Dick says. When it’s put like that-- well. It makes sense, in a warped, Damian-esque way. 

“In the future, I will be sure to apply that outlook upon any physical encounters that might occur.”

“Not for a long time,” Dick says. 

“Not _ever_ , unless I experience a marked alteration of mind. It is something I have no interest in at present, and I do not expect it to change.”

Dick has never had an interest in it either. All those fumbling encounters Wally had told him about, hushed and secret so that Bruce didn’t find out and ‘astonish him with consequences’. The memorable trip to the botanical gardens in eighth grade where _six_ pairs of kids snuck off to make out and the teachers thought they’d been abducted until they found them in a series of rare ornamental bushes. The way people seem to seek it out, and need it--

Never, in his life. Which makes it even more of his fault. Kori was literally an alien and sex had never come up with them, but when Mirage entered the room disguised as her, all hands and desire, Dick hadn’t questioned it. He’d thought maybe she’d seen some movie, or that someone had told her about it, and she was curious, and so…

He went along with it. 

No wonder she’d been mad. He’d misjudged her so completely, and in a way, violated her too. 

And as far as Barbara… she never pushed. She’d asked him to hold hands, and he’d done it. That wasn’t so bad. Snuggling to watch movies-- perfect. He’d done that with Bruce so many times as a child. Kissing-- he could _do_ it, but the saliva always grossed him out. And when he hadn’t initiated anything further, she’d seemed to understand. 

Looking back on it, she’d explained their breakup with the words, “I think you and I want different things out of this relationship.” That had been true, in many ways, but now… he sees that she could have meant sexually, too. 

It’s funny that a child half his age seems to have a better sense of consent than he does.

He leaves, feeling buoyed by Damian’s seeming understanding, but at the same time.

At the same time. 

Isn’t it ridiculous? Damian has captured it all in a concise summary, and Dick’s twenty five, and this May will be eleven years.

Eleven years since he started doing that. Since people started doing it to him, at him.

And it’s still this confusing, this upsetting. He can barely talk about it. He’s supposed to be the adult, but stammering out explanations of something he’s never experienced--

God.

He heads to his own room and gets into the shower. He’d showered this morning, but it’s something to do. And right now he feels fucking disgusting. 

Under the stream of the water, he looks at his arms. His legs. His torso. The abs and lats that people love to trail their fingers down. And, there, at the juncture of his legs and abdomen, what most seem to receive such pleasure from, and what he’s been complimented for, and what people focus most of their attention on. 

What, even when he’d experienced what others called pleasure, was more of an overwhelming terror than anything else. The loss of control. Body seizing up. Not being able to stop it.

He really is so filthy. All the hands that have been on him, all the people who’ve gotten enjoyment from something he finds to be a disgusting burden-- 

If he hates it so much, then why does he continue to do it? Even the least sentient animals know to recoil from something that hurts them. 

But--

He chooses it, and so he doesn’t have much right to be upset at all. He’s not a victim. 

So what if Slade did that to him morning, noon, and night? The phantasmagoria of living in those days exists only in his mind. He has no _proof_. Slade’s dead, and no one ever actually _saw_ what went on. They heard it, sure, and sometimes he heard _them_ laughing about it, but--

He has scars from the wreck. That’s true. 

But everything else? The mental games, the cruelty, the training, what he did to his _body_ …

There’s no proof, except in his mind, and how can he be sure that he’s not exaggerating it? 

He has the scrub brush in his hand.

He remembers Jason, cleaning those baseboards so desperately, as if no one else could understand the significance of it, or why they had to be that way. That clean clean house, so pristine, decorated perfectly, because Jason had decided it needed to be just so. The feeling of freedom and expansiveness when a room’s so flawless and absent of filthy human influence. 

He starts scrubbing himself, and he doesn’t stop. 

  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please, PLEASE let me know what you think. I get a genuine smile on my face every time I see there's been a comment. I especially love it when y'all point out specific things you enjoyed, because it helps me to keep writing stuff like that in the future. <3 <3


	2. Heavy Air

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Dick and Jason continue their investigation into the missing and dead children. Tim tries to help in a way Dick won't allow.

Dick has always found it strange how easily the GCPD cooperates with Batman and his cohort. Other superheroes have their own relationships with law enforcement, of course, but Batman and Commissioner Gordon -- Bruce and Jim-- work together so well that sometimes Dick suspects that Jim knows everyone’s identities after all. Or, if he doesn’t know them, then he at least has strong suspicions. That would only make sense. _Jim_ defers to _Bruce_ in a way that doesn’t make sense without an underlying relationship of hero to policeman. 

He thinks back to his adoption, and how easy Jim had made it. Bruce had taken him home that night, actually. The night his parents died. He can’t imagine how that could have happened without Jim’s interference. 

Either way, regardless of if Jim knows them or not, he’s gotten them all the information that the police department has on this particular case. Three bodies, three victims. The pathology reports refer to them as ‘the decedent’ but Dick can’t handle that clinicism.

The kids.

They’d been dead too long for forensics to get much information on them. They weren’t fresh corpses, and the longer the postmortem interval, the harder it is to determine anything with certainty. When bodies are fresh, livor and rigor mortis can show if a body was moved after death, or if they were killed at the location where they were found. But once decomposition begins, with autolysis and growth of microbes and advent of insect colonization-- it’s harder. Still possible, because bodies tend to follow a certain pattern of decay, and insects feature at certain times of year with different larval stages. Still possible, yes, but harder.

When it’s like the bodies of these kids? Mostly skeletonized? Even more difficult. The tarps the bodies were wrapped in had accelerated their decomposition, trapping gasses and encouraging anaerobic processes to occur. They’d been covered in adipocere, and with very little flesh remaining. 

With only skeletal remains, the cause of death can't be determined with certainty, unless said cause inflicted trauma to the bone structure, and even then, with these corpses-- all they could say for sure was that the bludgeoning had been perimortem, as fractures on ‘wet’ bone present differently than fractures that occur in ‘dry’ bone. All skeletons featured significant blunt force trauma to the torso and head, but in the absence of other indicators, it’s impossible to be sure if that’s what caused their deaths. 

If this were a case that ‘mattered’, something high-profile and with the funds to match, they could find out more about the first body. If not her name, then where she’d grown up and spent her living years, what her precise age was at death. Radiocarbon analysis through accelerated mass spectrometry is phenomenally accurate. That requires a lot of money and equipment, though, and while the Batcave is equipped with a mass spectrometer, and both gas and liquid chromatographs, that level of analysis is something even they can’t do. 

It sounds heartless, but the identity of the girl doesn’t matter much to the investigation. They know enough. Her long bones weren’t fully fused at the epiphyses; that gives a reasonably accurate indication of age at death: sixteen at most. 

(When he’d been with Slade his bones hadn’t fused yet. His bones _hadn’t fused yet_. He was, physiologically speaking… a child. If he’d died and Slade had stripped his skeleton and dumped him like these kids, whoever ended up examining his bones would have called him a child.)

She had all her adult teeth, meaning absolute bottom age of twelve, but despite their recent eruption they were in horrible shape. Poor diet and lack of hygiene-- no fault of the girl’s own, of course; it never is, in children that young. It’s induced by circumstances or lack of guardian oversight. Her long bones didn’t show rings of interrupted growth from sustained lack of nutrition, so she’d never _starved_ , but she might have gone hungry. 

Tim had run analyses on strands of hair provided by Jim Gordon. The girl’s hair was just above chin length; that was about a year of history, based on the average growth rate of half an inch a month.

The hair indicated prolonged use of heroin, with interspersed periods of other drugs. Those were infrequent, though, and all signs pointed to the girl having become addicted to heroin, with the usage period long enough that no ‘clean’ time intervals were found in her hair.

The second body found, the boy, was identified as a kid who had bounced from foster home to foster home after both his parents were sent to prison on felony robbery charges. That had been when he was ten. He’d never stayed in one home for long, and he’d gone off the record completely at age fourteen, two years ago. The ‘freshest’ one found, in terms of ability to date the corpse. His hair had been short, but, as with the first corpse, indicated premortem use of heroin.

The second girl came from a family with a long history of investigation by Child Protective Services, but apparently it had never been ‘bad’ enough to seize her. Barbara had gotten them the files on her. She’d had difficulties in school and exhibited sexual knowledge that was far more than appropriate for her age; she’d been suspended multiple times and a certain display of sexuality got her expelled from school at the age of 17. The system had seen her as a delinquent, instead of a product of her environment. After that, she’d hit the streets, and her ‘family’ had lost contact with her almost immediately. That had been three years ago. 

Dick’s been to abuse calls, and he’s also been the accompanying officer when social workers make visits. Some of the things he’s seen have been-- unbelievable. Even more unbelievable that they don't take the kids in certain cases. They don’t get seized unless they’re seen to be in immediate, life-threatening danger. Children with filthy clothes and bruises and fear in their eyes, living in places that are less than habitable-- their parents get warnings and maybe a followup visit, and most times, the kids are left with the people who’d rendered them into that state to begin with. 

The caseworkers would say that there wasn’t enough evidence or reason to take action, and that the children wouldn’t say anything about it, and it made Dick want to scream to the sky. Of course the children wouldn’t admit what was happening to them-- it was normal in their world, and desire to cling to parents is universal, even when they're sacks of unrepentant garbage. Kids lie out of fear, or out of a desire to stay with their family, or because their parents have coached them. It doesn’t mean that what’s happening _isn’t happening_.

That girl, the oldest in terms of age at death, had hair just below her shoulders. About two years of data. And, as with the boy and the other girl, heroin use was indicated throughout that timespan.

DIck’s never done drugs. Not even once. Maybe it was the influence of his parents, and Bruce, but he’d never felt even an inkling of desire to participate in the usual teenage rebellion of smoking cigarettes and weed. He’d never gone to high school parties where blunts might be passed around, and when the affluent kids at Gotham Academy talked about ‘skiiing’ and ‘perfect snow’, he’d pretended to take them at face value. 

He’s seen a lot of drugs, obviously, both in the course of his night career and as a police officer, but aside from prescribed medications and the occasional drink, he’s never intentionally been under the influence of anything more. Others would consider that a cute naivete, but as far as he knows, the entire superhero community is the same. Otherwise things would fall apart. Roy’s period of trouble was indicative enough of that. Hard to save others when you’re struggling to save yourself from addiction. 

Jason knows more. He grew up around it, in the midst of it. Never did it, but saw the effects first-hand. Catherine Todd had died of an overdose, and then he’d ended up on the streets. No way to stay safely ignorant in that kind of environment.

“Heroin makes sense,” he’d said when Tim presented the information. “It’s addictive as fuck. People’ll do anything for a score.” 

Tim had asked, “Do you think they were prostituting for the money for it?” 

“Or the drug itself,” Jason had shrugged. “For the hardest addicts the two end up as basically the same thing.”

Young adults lured away by a john who promised money, or drugs, or both. They’d go with him to a secluded location and then... terror, and abuse, and finally death. 

That’s their strongest avenue of investigation at the moment. 

“We can’t interview the johns,” Jason said. “None of them would ever talk to capes. The street workers--”

Dick imagined going from street corner to street corner with Jason. They’d look ridiculous, a pretty boy and a giant hulking man. Best case scenario, they’d think Jason was his pimp and be terrified. Worst case, they’d think they were undercover officers, and clam up entirely. And nowadays, no one in the family would ever consider letting Dick go alone.

“I could go,” Tim said. “I’m young enough; I’d blend in.”

At hearing that, Dick’s entire body stung with frissons of nervous energy, and he’d said, “That’s a hard negative, Timmy.” 

Then came the inevitable. In a way, it was like dealing with Damian. The insistence that they were _old enough_ , and _could do it_ , and all the rest that, to his ears, sounded like a child pleading to go to the playground across town alone.

“I’ve done it before,” Tim said. “In other investigations.” 

“Not with this kind of operation,” Dick said. “Never these kinds of crimes.” 

“Because I’ve always been _too young_ for Bruce to let me. But right now--” 

“Right now is _never_ ,” Dick said. “Over my _dead fucking body_.” 

Silence had invaded the room, both Jason and Tim looking alarmed by his sudden vehemence and the phrase he had used.

“I’ll ask Bruce,” Tim said finally.

“Go ahead,” Dick threw back. “He’ll tell you the same thing.”

Tim had shot them a glare, the indignance born of still being seen as a child in certain circumstances, and then gone upstairs. Bruce was at work, and certainly wouldn’t discuss said things unless in the Manor or another controlled environment, so Tim would have to wait until he got home to beg.

To beg to expose himself to sexual violence and potential life-threatening danger, all for a case that the GCPD _should_ be handling anyway. 

Jesus Christ. 

“Sure he’ll say ‘no’?” Jason had asked, seemingly unimpressed by Tim’s little fit. 

“If he doesn’t,” Dick said, “there’s going to be a huge problem. I’ll _make_ it that way.” 

And so now Dick’s waiting in the garage, all the better to pounce on Bruce the moment he gets out of the car. Tim is _not_ getting first shot at Bruce over this matter. It’s not that Dick thinks Bruce will say yes-- not now, at least, with all that’s come to light--, but it’s ridiculous that--

It’s ridiculous that he’s even having to think of this. What kind of fucked-up situation is this, where a 17-year-old boy, with no real sexual experience _at all_ as far as Dick knows, is begging to go undercover as a heroin-addicted prostitute all in order to _just maybe_ get a bit of information? 

Who the fuck volunteers to do that? He’s a _child_. 

It doesn’t matter. Dick’s not going to let it happen. He’ll fight Bruce to the end of the line on this one. And when it comes to fighting Bruce, he always wins. He knows what to say and how to say it. Bruce never, ever argues back, not the way he does with Jason. He protects Dick from all his negative emotions, always the father figure and never the fighter.

Bruce gets off work early on Fridays, and he pulls into the garage at the usual time-- 5:30 PM. 

He had to have seen Dick loitering as he’d driven in, because he gets out and seems absolutely unsurprised to see him. 

“Hi Dick,” he says. “Did you have a good day?” 

Dick doesn’t know what the definition of a ‘good day’ is anymore. It’s all-- pretty much the same. He wakes up after a night of shitty disrupted sleep, soaked in sweat and exhausted, and takes a shower during which he attempts not to look at his hideous body and all the things for which others find it ‘beautiful’.

After that he tries to force himself to eat something while avoiding the others. He exercises and gets frustrated at his own inadequacies and how the lost weight has made him less powerful, and how his foot still isn’t _completely_ healed.

Then he takes another shower which, again, is themed by his disgust at his own body. Then maybe he talks to Jason or tries to eat something else, which inevitably ends in failure despite the pills Leslie had prescribed him. Damian and Tim come home and he tries to be a good example for them, and then it’s dinner and eyes on him as he tries and fails _yet afuckinggain_ to ingest anything of substance. 

After that, he’s off to his room, where he showers again as if to torture himself but really because he feels so. fucking. dirty. And then he enjoys a few hours of trying to fall the fuck asleep with racing thoughts that seem to connect everything, absolutely everything, to his days with Slade. When he finally does get to sleep, he's gifted with hours of nightmares, and then he wakes up in the morning and everything starts over again.

So, in the face of all that--

He lies, and says, “It was okay.” 

Bruce looks genuinely glad to hear it, and Dick feels shitty for lying to him. He’s rummaging in the back seat of the car, probably gathering all the work he brings home over the weekends. Dick decides to let him do it, and is dragging his fingers contemplatively over the hood when he hears crinkling behind him. 

He turns around. Bruce is smiling like an idiot and holds a bag of candy that contains weirdly orange, misshapen lumps that some might say resembled peanuts.

“Circus peanuts?” he asks, and despite himself he’s maybe smiling a little too. “Those things are _disgusting_.” 

“I know,” Bruce says. “They added them to the vending machine on the 31st floor for some reason, I have no clue why, but when I saw them--” 

Bruce’s date to the performance, on the night the Graysons died, had for some reason insisted on buying circus peanuts from the concession stand. Dick doesn’t know who the woman was, and in all likelihood Bruce doesn’t even remember her name, but she was important in one very pivotal aspect.

The crowd had been dispersed after his parents had fallen, and he remembers sitting on the tailgate of some truck, maybe one owned by the circus, a useless little space blanket crumpled across his lap, while some lady from who the fuck knew where attempted to calm him down. He’d been lost, and disorientated, and still trying to _process_ what had happened, and paying absolutely no attention to anything.

Then Bruce Wayne arrived. He remembers it just as well as he remembers his parents falling. 

The lady incessantly talking _at_ him shut up immediately, much to his relief. There was a police officer at Bruce’s side, one who he’d come to learn was named _Jim Gordon_. He’d waved the woman away and Bruce had approached.

In his left hand, looking impossibly small and childish, was a bag of circus peanuts. He’d knelt down and held them out, and said, “I’ve always hated these things, but I bet you’re hungry.” 

Dick had always hated them too, but in that moment, when the world had very suddenly become so large and scary and strange, and as the future seemed to be staring at him as if it were about to devour him whole--

He’d eaten half the bag of the sugary nonsense, and nothing had ever tasted so good. 

Bruce had sat beside him on the bed of that truck, while Gordon talked to the lady, and they’d debated on which piece in the bag looked the most like an actual peanut. They’d come to the decision that the molds that made the candy had to be rather poor indeed, because all of them were just fuzzy outlines, and if you didn’t _know_ that they were supposed to be peanuts, you’d never have guessed.

“I love you,” Bruce says.

Back to the present.

Dick looks at him, and then back to the peanuts, and back to Bruce again. Bruce’s smile has gotten a little wobbly.

“I love you,” Bruce says, “and I know this isn’t anything, but-- it reminded me of you, and how glad I am to have you in my life.” 

It’s hard to say. He thinks it all the time. But unless it’s to Dami, who needs to hear it and craves those words--

It’s gotten really difficult. More difficult than it’s ever been. 

“I love you too,” Dick says, and Bruce is hugging him, arms wrapped entirely around him and chin atop his head, all warmth and strength and protection, and for just a moment-- for just a moment--

Things feel a little less awful. 

* * *

He and Jason -- _Nightwing_ and _Red Hood_ \-- are out tonight. They’ve got a building to sweep. They’d sat down and come up with a list of places _they’d_ hide a body, if they were killing, and so--

This building is a little further out from Gotham proper-- an abandoned coffin factory. It had been a thriving business during World War II, one of the largest producers in the country. As the twenty-first century approached, production began to move overseas and eventually the company shut down. It’s been vacant for maybe twenty, thirty years-- since before Dick became Robin, in any case. The building squats on about ten acres of land and the whole property is surrounded by chain-link, barbed wire-topped fencing. 

Its location, plus the fencing, is enough to keep out most people. Maybe a few urban explorers have come and gone over the years, their insatiable curiosity driving them to trespass. He doesn’t find it safe or smart, but he’s run into them before, and they’re harmless. 

Other people, though-- the others who’d drive to the outskirts of Gotham, and circumvent the fencing, and trek across the acres of land-- those people most likely have worse intentions. 

They’d decided to come here out of that simple rationale.

The bodies in Gotham proper had been found because they were in buildings that had had _some_ kind of traffic in and out. Populations in abandoned buildings are transient-- stay too long and you get scared off by security, or someone gets into a fight with someone else-- and so they move from place to place. In a way, they had a group of people already searching, albeit unknowingly and unintentionally, simply by merit of their lifestyle. The majority of people would call in to report a body, even if they weren’t the most upstanding, as proven by the way GCPD had found out about the case in the first place. 

So it makes sense to concentrate on buildings that haven’t seen people in a while, or which require more than casual interest to gain access to. Those places are the ones that, statistically speaking, are most likely to be used by predators to commit their crimes.

He and Jason had ridden their motorcycles here once dusk had set at the Manor. They’ve come to a side gate of the facility, which is shrouded by trees and bushes. It’s locked with a chain and two padlocks, and while they _could_ cut the chain, or pick one of the locks, it’s easier to jump the fence.

And now, he _can_ jump. His foot still isn’t completely better, but it’s healed enough to ride a motorcycle, and to rest comfortably on it when he’s at a stop, and to change gears without feeling the bones protest. He can even do basic gymnastic routines in the Batcave without feeling the pain. 

It feels good to be able to be in the field again.

They pull the bikes up against the fence, hidden by the bushes, and cover them up with camouflage sheets brought specifically for the purpose. Jason tucks the sheet around his bike with great care. 

“If someone fucking steals my bike--”

“Who’s going to steal it, a raccoon?”

Jason scans the woods, thermal lenses engaged. Dick’s done it already. There’s no one here. Some squirrels are watching them curiously from the trees, and a herd of deer graze far away on the field ahead, but other than that-- it’s silent, and still. 

Besides, their bikes have electronic ignitions, and they’ve got to be within touching distance for them to start. They’re protected by proprietary Bat technology, just like everything else they use. Anyone looking to steal them would have to drag them away on foot, or somehow load them up into the bed of a truck. Not likely.

“Let’s go,” Dick says, and then, with great satisfaction, he hops over the fence first. He intentionally lands with his weight mostly on his uninjured foot, but even allowing for that-- he can _do things_ again, and it’s amazing. 

Behind him, Jason clambers over the fence with less grace, but equal effectiveness. The barbed wire means nothing to them, their suits as protective as they are. 

Then they’re off across the property. The deer he’d seen earlier pop their heads up and run away, bounding across the lawn until they go out of sight. Someone pays for the upkeep of the property, but the building itself is derelict and boarded up. 

They dart from bush to bush, crossing the lawn quietly, using their thermal lenses to sweep the area as they approach. They need to stay off the radar of anyone who might be here-- one of them might be the perpetrator, and if they see Nightwing and Red Hood clearly investigating _something_ , they’ll switch to different dumping places entirely. 

He and Jason have a specific objective tonight, so they’re not going to interfere in other things unless they absolutely have to. They can’t be noticed. Discretion is the better part of valor, when it comes to these types of cases.

They come to the side of the building. A few of the second-floor windows aren’t covered, so they grapple to them and enter the building.

The thing about thermal imaging-- it requires heat signatures to show anything. It reveals the living, and hot pipes, and running engines, and things like that. But here, inside this building, where everything is cool and calm and quiet, it’s useless. It’s the same with infrared or night vision technology; _some_ source of light is required.

The building is absolutely dark. They pull out their flashlights. Neither of them like headlamps-- too easy to blind each other, and too difficult to direct the beam of light.

The room they’ve entered into is lit up by the LEDs, which throw off a bright, blue-tinged light. Inky shadows persist behind the objects in the room, stretching away from them, and as they begin to move, they twist around them like children watching from a cracked doorway. 

It must have been an office at one point-- a few overturned desks, paper scattered and halfway eaten by rodents, books sprawled across the floor and covered in mildew.

The floors seem steady enough, but he still tests their stability with every step, gently placing his front foot down and probing before putting any significant weight upon it. Jason follows behind him. It makes sense. If he falls, Jason can rescue him. If Jason falls, it’ll be a lot more of an ordeal for Dick to save him, in the state that he’s in. Jason is heavier by sixty-five pounds at this point, if he’s still at his maintenance weight and if Dick _hasn’t_ lost any more since Leslie’s visit. 

He tries not to think about it. It only makes him feel weaker.

They search the upstairs rooms, one by one. Several offices, what might have been a break room, and now what must have been an area for document storage. Fallen shelves and boxes of files are spread across the room. The air is saturated with the smell of rodent urine. 

“I don’t think there’s anything up here,” he says, scrunching his nose, “except a lot of rats.”

Jason kicks a banker’s box of documents and a rat goes scurrying. He’s lucky. His helmet filters out most smells.

“Gonna have to agree with you there,” he says. 

They head downstairs. Dick walks tentatively, ensuring their (relative) structural integrity before advancing down each step. They still creak, and creak even _more_ when Jason steps on them.

“Be careful,” he says.

“This isn’t my first rodeo.”

“Jay.”

He doesn’t want to have to explain that he’s not sure he could haul Jason out of someplace like this, with the muscle that he’s lost. Jason seems to understand anyway.

“Yes, mother,” he sings, and they reach the first floor. 

It’s more open than the second floor had been. Something near the boarded-off front doors looks like it might have been a reception area, with torn-up couches and a couple of coffee tables. Further away, in either direction, are what look like workshops. They search those too, careful to avoid hazards on the floor. They’ve been gutted of anything useful, and what remains are a few planks of wood, maybe the stripped leftovers of a table saw. The workshop tables are covered in junk. 

So far, it’s a typical abandoned factory. There’s a little graffiti, here and there, nonsense things whose point or purpose he never understands, but all in all, it looks pretty undisturbed.

The floor plans for the building had indicated a basement, accessible in the northeast corner of the first floor. They head over. The stairs here are more industrial-- wide metal grids that stretch down into the darkness. Dick scans his flashlight across the first flight of steps. They’re rusted, but look intact.

He pulls out his handheld gas meter. A small thing, often overlooked by those not in the business. When he’s in better moods he gets amused by the idea that’s often presented in fiction: superheroes darting through storm drains and caves, unaffected by the noxious gases that accumulate in such areas. In reality, people die every day from venturing into confined spaces without the proper equipment. 

The gas meter buzzes for a second as it turns on and intakes its initial air from the environment. He’d calibrated it at the Cave that night, before they left. It tests for oxygen, carbon monoxide, hydrogen sulfide, and combustible elements in the air. Oxygen is lighter than most gases harmful to humans, and so, in places like this, where it’s still and there’s no circulation--

The air itself can be injurious, even fatal. 

The meter will sound an alarm if anything’s out of acceptable range, and, with it clipped to Dick’s belt, they descend.

There’s a bit of standing water when they reach the basement level. Not much, maybe six inches, but it’s enough to reflect the glow of the flashlights and send it into a mirror-like scintillation along the walls. Instead of walking, he pushes his feet forward for each ‘step’, maintaining contact with the floor. Debris moves out of the way unless it’s significant, and he doesn’t want to be putting his foot down on something sharp. His boots aren’t as sturdy as Jason’s-- they have to be flexible, for the way he moves and fights, so it’s entirely possible for a large enough nail to impale his foot, if he were to land the wrong way.

 _That’s_ something that he doesn’t fucking need.

The air is thick and close down here. Not enough to set an alarm off in the meter, but it still smells dank and dirty, in a way that’s different than that of the other two floors. The water and mildew have overtaken this place. He’s not even sure what it had been in its prior life.

“This is absolutely delightful,” Jason says, sloshing up behind him. “I feel only maybe half like we’re in a horror game.”

“Hush,” Dick says. 

Jason gives a cackle. “There’s this game, _Amnesia: The Dark Descent_. It’s old as fuck but the basement scene in it is _freaky_. There’s this invisible demon creature that eats you if you touch the water.”

“If that were the case,” Dick says, “I’m pretty sure we’d be goners already.”

At least the basement in this area is an open floor plan. It’s easier to navigate, even if the lack of walls or other features makes it difficult to orientate himself. As they walk away from the stairs, and more toward the south side of the building, the water level subsides. The foundations must have shifted significantly, for this level of gradient to occur. Then again, it’s over a hundred years old-- it’s to be expected. 

With the water gone, he can step more freely again, and soon they reach another set of offices or storage rooms or whatever they might have been fifty years ago. The doors are closed and the first one is jammed. The doorknob won’t turn. He doesn’t bother to inspect it; instead, he kicks it open with his (uninjured) foot. It takes a couple of tries-- it’s a solid door. Finally, it crashes inwards.

The air from the room comes rushing out, intermixing with what had been in the basement at large. 

And that’s when he knows it.

Human bodies smell. That’s obvious. All decaying flesh smells. Putrescine and cadaverine are two of the most common byproducts of decomposition, and are what result in the smell that everyone, on a base level, recognizes. Most markers are shared, but certain vary from species to species. This specificity is useful; humans and pigs produce unique compounds upon decay, ones that aren’t found in decomposing tissue from any other animals. Simple science, but people who have never smelled a dead _human_ might think of all death smells as being the same. 

They aren't.

And that’s why he’s able to realize it, before he runs his flashlight across the room.

“Jay,” he says.

“The fuck do you think this was?” Jason responds from behind him, gesturing to a jumble of rusted steel ten feet to his left. 

“We’ve got it,” he says. 

“What?”

“ _Look_ ,” he says, because he can’t tell Jason to _smell_. He breathes through his helmet, after all. Right now he’s envious, so envious. 

Jason’s flashlight joins his own, sweeping over the room.

There’s three bundles. Three human-shaped lumps wrapped in white Tyvek sheeting.

A foot peeks out from the end of the wrapping, half black with still-rotting flesh. 

“Fuck,” says Jason. 

“Three this time,” Dick says, and it feels like he’s numb entirely. His arms and legs are tingling, perhaps from his now-perpetual lightheadedness, or maybe from the adrenaline. 

He wonders if _their_ bones have fused.

“Hey,” Jason snaps. “Keep it together.”

“I am,” he says faintly. 

Jason grabs his arm and pulls him from the doorway. Dick stumbles back with him. Jason deposits him on what might have been a work table after shoving all the debris off it. 

“Call Gordon,” he says. “I’m going to check the other rooms. Don’t _fucking_ go anywhere.”

Dick struggles to reach his radio but he doesn’t know why, because they’re too far from GCPD headquarters for its transmission to reach. He needs the satellite phone. He needs to get up, go back upstairs, get to where it has signal. He needs to call. He needs to do something.

He needs to be useful.

His feet twitch and he prepares to hop off the table. As soon as his arms move to brace himself--

“Don’t even _think_ about it,” Jason warns, from twenty feet away.

He kicks in another of the doors. As it falls in, the sound it makes is punctuated by a vehement, “ _Jesus fuck_.”

And so-- for two more doors, two more rooms, Dick watches this series of sick discoveries. He hears Jason say certain things, sounding so angry and disgusted, but they’re no longer making sense to him.

What is _wrong_ with him? 

He’s got to focus. He really, really has to focus. He pulls off a glove and claws at the skin on the back of his hand, _hard_. It returns him to the current moment. 

Jason comes back. 

“Alright,” he says, “well at least we know what the fuck’s going on with this place, now.”

Dick feels so awake. The pain-- it’s awareness, and clarity, and something other than the fuzziness that had begun to overtake his mind. 

“I couldn’t call Gordon,” he says. “Not from here. Let’s head up.”

“Lead the way,” Jason says, and Dick gets off the bench. He puts his glove back on. Jason doesn’t notice.

They wade through the water, and head back up the stairs, and then they’re kicking down one of the boarded doors on the first floor. 

Dick makes it onto the lawn first. He catches a glance of the stars and then-- back the fuck down to the ground.

It’s _outside_ , so fresh and free, like back then, all those years ago. The bodies in the basement, they probably feel like he did. They must want to be outside too, to see the stars and get away from their fates. What’s killed them, and is killing their memory now too. 

He bites the inside of his lip, crushing it between his molars. He tastes blood. 

Come to reality.

He dials Gordon’s personal number. It rings, and when the man answers, Dick’s voice is steady and clear. 

* * *

The next day it’s Sunday.

He takes Damian out for a walk.

Out for a walk. That sounds like Dami is a dog.

He and Damian _go out_ for a walk.

That’s better.

“Is this intended to be exercise?” Damian asks, lacing up his shoes. 

“It’s intended to be _fun_ ,” Dick says back. 

He’d dreamt partly of his parents last night, when they’d gotten home from the factory and he’d scrubbed, scrubbed, scrubbed the filthy air from his body, the smell of death and his own awful nature. In the dream, they’d gone on a walk and looked for little animals in the woods, just like they did when they were alive. 

He hopes that, if somewhere and somehow they can see this, they’ll smile knowing that he’s continuing their tradition. 

It’s early May now; they’re dressed comfortably in short sleeves and hiking pants and trail runners. Probably overkill to wear such technical clothing-- it’s not like they’ll be climbing a mountain-- but Damian insists on the ‘proper’ apparel for every activity.

He’d sneered once at women wearing yoga pants. They’d been sitting at the window-facing bar of the ice cream joint when a group of college students went by, all wearing them. 

“They are not engaging in yoga,” Damian said. “Therefore, they should not be wearing pants that are specifically meant for that activity.”

“They’ve become a casual thing, Dami.”

“It is a marker of the downfall of society,” the boy replied. “One would not wear a tuxedo were one not attending a black-tie event; the logic is applicable in reverse as well, yet these… females seem not to be aware of it.”

“Most people don’t own tuxedos,” Dick said, “but they do own comfortable clothing.”

Damian had scoffed, and it made Dick feel a sudden surge of affection for him, and his sheltered quirkiness. 

Damian smooths down his shirtfront and asks, "Shall Titus accompany us?” 

“Let’s leave him in,” Dick says. “He might… interrupt things.”

Damian gives him a look that Dick has in turn given Bruce a thousand times. It says, _You’re weird, but I love you, so I’ll go along with your idea of ‘fun’_. 

He feels unfathomably blessed to receive it. This boy loves him so. He doesn’t know what he’s done to deserve it, but he’ll do anything to keep it. 

In his backpack he has two nets, a little plastic container, field guides to native wildlife, and two caramel-filled chocolate bars. 

They go outside and down the path to the Manor’s woods. There’s a main trail, lined with gravel and used by Alfred for “post-dinner digestion”. Then there are several unpaved trails that branch off in different directions. 

Dick takes them to a stream. It’s clear and fast-running, perhaps two feet deep, with various sizes of river stone comprising the bottom. Tree limbs shade the bank, but sunlight flickers here and there across the surface of the water. 

It’s perfect. 

“My parents used to do this with me,” he says, and though it hurts-- seeing Damian smile when he hears it is _so_ worth it. 

Damian surveys the surroundings. 

“What do you define as ‘this’?” 

“We called it frolicking,” Dick says. “Whenever we had a chance, we’d go into the woods and explore. Not hike, exactly, but we’d look for little insects, and other creatures, and identify them.” 

He pulls the field books, container, and nets out of his backpack. 

“... This does not hurt the... creatures?” 

“No,” Dick says. “Just be gentle.” 

He shows Damian how to flip over the stones in the creek. Damian collects macroinvertebrates in his net and they sit to identify them. Some of them try to scurry away, so they dump the contents of the net into the little bowl, which they’ve filled with river water. 

“This creature is a right-hand snail,” Damian reads from the field guide. “They have gills, and thus are sensitive to the dissolved oxygen content of the water. They are found in waterways with higher oxygen levels than their brethren, the left-hand snails.” 

Next, a strange wiggly creature with pincers and a multitude of legs.

“A hellgrammite, or Dobsonfly larvae.” 

“It’s creepy,” Dick says. “Its little pinching mouth. And the legs. It scuttles.” 

“I agree,” Damian says. “It _is_ rather unsettling.” 

It’s a beautiful day, and they’re both having fun.

He wonders why every day can’t be like this.

“They are also indicative of good water quality,” Damian says. 

And so they go, identifying creature after creature, returning them to the water after they’ve examined them. It’s something Dick hasn’t done in so long, and Damian has probably _never_ done it. Never sat down and taken the time to enjoy the woods, or to look at the littlest forms of life, or indulge his childish curiosity and find out what they are. 

And if he _had_ asked what something was, when he’d been in Talia’s clutches-- he’d have been punished for his ignorance, and for paying attention to something so insignificant and inessential. And with the family now-- no one _cares_ enough to read between the lines and see that Dami’s still just a kid. He might talk more eruditely than most adults, and fight better than them too, and have a whole bank of unchildlike knowledge, but--

Fuck that. Fuck treating him like his childhood is over. 

Damian’s life with him. The rest of it. Especially before he becomes an adult.

All that’s going to be different. 

He’s going to fill it with as much love as he possibly can. 

“Richard,” Damian says, tone curious, and Dick turns around to see him with a striped brown snake sitting sedately in his hands. 

“I have acquired a serpent,” Damian says. “It seems to be rather peaceful.”

They pull out the reptile and amphibian field guide. The snake curls around Damian’s wrist as they flip through and find a picture that resembles it. 

“Northern water snake,” Dick says. “ _Nerodia sipedon_.”

“I believe that I shall name her Sylvia.”

“How do you know it’s a she?’’

“I am perceiving a specific gender from her,” Damian says, with a tinge of silliness that no one else would pick up on. 

“Okay, she’s Sylvia then.”

She lifts her head and peers at him. 

“I am not exhibiting human emotion toward her by holding her,” Damian tells him, as if it's something he has to disclaim. “Especially in spring, reptiles enjoy proximity to warm surfaces. She was sunning herself on the bank when I found her, and my body is similarly warm. And the name-- it is simply for ease of identification in the future.”

… They hadn’t given special names or specific genders to any of the hellgrammites, or snails, or mayflies, or crawdads, and Dick wants to tell him that if he _were_ anthropomorphizing her, it would be entirely okay. That’s too bold though. Damian would shut down.

“Slither away,” Damian tells her as he sets her down onto the rocks again. She does, plopping into the water with gusto.

“Maybe she’s looking for a meal,” Dick says. “Apparently they eat fish and frogs.” 

“May she grow to be a healthy and large individual,” Damian says, with the seriousness of seeing someone off to war. 

They sit down on the bank again, still and quiet, and watch the wind sway the boughs above them. 

“Hey Dami,” he says after a while. “Guess who got you your favorite chocolate?” 

“I would assume it to be you,” Damian says. “I would also assume it to be within your knapsack, given that you mention it in this situation.” 

“A true detective,” Dick says, and then he’s got the chocolate, giving one bar to Dami. The other, he’ll try to eat. If it’s for Damian, then he’ll try anything at all. 

“Pennyworth would insist that we wash our hands,” Damian says, glancing around as if the butler might be crouching in the forest wearing a ghillie suit to spy on them.

“It makes your immune system stronger to eat with dirty hands. Or at least, that’s what my mom always told me.” 

“She seems to have been a venerable woman,” Damian intones. “I shall take her words to heart.” 

They sit on the bank, breaking off piece by piece of chocolate, and Dick finds that if he focuses on Damian’s voice, and his assessment of the varied and strange animals to be found in the field book, he can even eat it without wanting to immediately regurgitate it.

This boy is his safety, his strength, his salvation.

* * *

Dick’s staring at a bowl of blueberries when Tim comes into the room.

He looks up from his row of contestants-- out of the bowl, he’d picked ten of the bluest, roundest, plumpest blueberries and lined them up on a paper towel. Once he’s done picking these off, one by one, he’ll go back to the bowl again and pick the next ten victims. This form of attempting to eat has become a part of his daily routine.

If they were sentient, would they feel horror at seeing him line them up? Maybe they’d try to hide at the bottom of the pile, shoving each other out of the way in a frantic attempt to not be victimized. They’d try to cover up as best they could, marr and ruin themselves, just so they wouldn’t be taken.

What the fuck is wrong with him.

“Hey Timmy,” he says. He shoves the blueberries back into the bowl. He can pick up with this later. Right now he needs to show Tim that he’s not completely falling apart. 

“... I didn’t ask Bruce,” Tim says.

Dick contemplates. It’s been a few days since that conversation, and he’d heard nothing since, so he’d assumed Bruce had laid down an emphatic rejection of the idea.

“Figured he’d say no too?” 

“That’s not why,” Tim says, and he pulls up a chair across from Dick. “I decided it didn’t matter what he said.” 

He looks up at Tim, whose face is perpetually so precise and focused. He wonders what people see when they look at him, nowadays. When he looks into the mirror, all he sees is someone whose own body is a traitor, attracting attention and harm even when he pleads with it to keep its _beauty_ hidden. 

“I decided it didn’t matter,” Tim continues, “because even if he said ‘yes’, you were right.” 

Dick blinks.

“I was right?” 

“Yes.” 

“You don’t even know my reasoning,” Dick mutters. At least, he hopes Tim doesn’t. He hopes he’d thought it as just another example of Dick being an overprotective big brother, and not-- not because he _knows_ how those things hurt. And hurt. And hurt. 

Forever.

“I’m not in your head,” Tim says, “so I can’t say for certain, but I think I understand enough. And you’re right. It seems like-- it’s not worth it.” 

“Not for you,” Dick says. “Never for you. Or anyone else.” 

Tim meets his gaze quietly.

“I considered it, after I left the Cave and came back upstairs.” 

Tim considers everything. That’s no surprise. His mind is a land of deep inspection and analysis, where everything gets unraveled to the barest thread of truth and reality, then put back together in a way that leaves facts and reasoning laid bare. It’s stringent, a sterile lab environment, but so good at piecing out each and every detail of life. 

“And-- first off, I’ve never done anything like that before. I wouldn’t blend in anyway. Hard to be a virginal teenage prostitute.” 

“Everyone’s a virgin at some point,” Dick says, even though Tim hadn’t had an inkling of shame in his voice. He’s glad about that, with this family-- that sex isn’t seen as something to plunge into, or something that defines people.

Only him.

Bruce has been a good example for all of them. Despite his reputation as a playboy, he’s celibate-- aside from his interactions with Selina Kyle, who by turns is charming and infuriating. She’s a good person, deep down, and he thinks they help each other in a way, so, as weird as it sounds for a son to be commenting on his father’s sex life, he ‘approves’ of Bruce having that contact with her. 

“I know,” Tim says, “and I also know that it’s considered… a formative experience.” 

Dick’s had certainly been formative. He remembers it. Slade had given him a few days to make up his mind about whether or not he wanted to resist. The thought of… that kind of persuasion… hadn’t entered his mind at all. He’d been so innocent. 

Then Slade had entered the room, asked for his final answer, and accepted it seemingly without surprise or anger. Dick had felt relief, and thought maybe the mercenary had realized that he’d _never, ever_ surrender (what a fucking lie). 

But instead. The man had fucked him with no explanation, no reason as to why he was doing it. Dick had had an idea, purely theoretical, of what sex was supposed to be like, but--

“A lot of people agree with that,” Dick says. He doesn’t want to put too much pressure on it, or too much emphasis. Not everyone is as _injured_ by sex as he’s been, he knows, and some people even enjoy it. But if Tim does have a less than perfect time-- well, he doesn’t want him to think of it as being _the_ formation of everything to come. 

He doesn’t want Tim to be cursed like that.

“In better news,” Tim says, “I got the grade back on my pie. It got a 95.” 

His brother has apparently picked up on his morosity. It’s pathetic of him, but he appreciates the change of subject. 

“Only that? It was perfect. Like the Vitruvian Man of apple pies.” 

“I… may have broken the crust on the way to school.” 

“Oh,” Dick says. “Well, you win some, you lose some.” 

“It’s still an A, so I don’t mind. But I have a favor to ask.” 

Dick thinks of Jason, and his outrage at the idea of Dick _thanking_ him for being a good brother.

“Family don’t do each other favors,” he says. “They help each other.” 

“Okay then, I need some help.” 

“More baking?” 

“No,” Tim says. “We moved on from baking after the pie. But-- it’s not for that class anyway.” 

“You’re better than I am at academics; don’t know if I can help there.” 

“It’s not… for any class.” 

“Gonna have to give me a hint, kiddo.” 

“Thinking about everything prompted me to do something.”

“Timmers--”

“Iaskedagirltoprom,” he says. “Shesaidyes.”

Dick puts it through his ‘Tim’s Hyper Speech’ translator.

“That’s great!” 

Tim clutches a handful of his hair. 

“It’s not,” he says. “She said yes yesterday, and it’s in three weeks, and I feel totally unprepared and I don’t even know why I _asked_ her.” 

“Do you like her?”

“I don’t _know_ ,” Tim says. 

“I’m not talking about _liking_ her, liking her. I mean, do you like her as a person?” 

“Yes,” Tim says. “That’s why I asked her to begin with.”

“Then it’ll be spending more time with her, and getting to know her better.”

DIck thinks of the general context of prom night. He’d never gone; he’d told the kids at Gotham Academy that Bruce was too overprotective to even think of permitting such a thing. And maybe that was true, but he’d never even broached the subject to him. He’d had no interest.

And-- there’s always the implication of what happens _afterwards_. Wally had been ecstatic when he’d gone “all the way” with his date after his junior prom. Dick, newly fifteen, had thought it was a ridiculous reaction. Nothing special about sex. Nothing to enjoy. It hurt, and was disgusting and degrading, and that was all.

It had been hard to separate that idea from Wally’s enthusiastic retelling. He didn’t get too graphic, but he’d made it sound fun, and thrilling, and enjoyable.

He’d said, “It was great-- and we’ve been texting ever since.”

“I’m glad you had a good time,” was all that Dick had replied.

Then Wally said back, “Do you ever… think about wanting to do things like that?”

Dick had almost thrown up while still on the phone. 

“ _No_ ,” he’d said. “No. I-- want to wait.” 

“Nothing wrong with that,” Wally said hurriedly, apparently mistaking his disgust for embarrassment. “I wasn’t trying to, you know, be a bad influence.” 

“Are you still paranoid about Bruce?” 

“ _Yes_ ,” Wally said. “He gives me that talk once every six months, like clockwork. It’s like having to renew a license or something.”

“I thought you’d be used to it by now.” 

“Nah man, your dad is scary as hell.”

“Not Batman?” 

“ _Your dad_ ,” Wally had repeated. “I would rather get in a fight with Batman than go up against Bruce Wayne in dad mode.” 

And Bruce _was_ scary in his dedication to being a father. Especially back then. It had been why Dick never told, after all. 

But beyond that.

Tim’s asking him for help regarding a _date_. 

Tim knows what Dick has done, but he doesn’t know the _specifics_. He’s a detective, and a genius, but he’s not thoroughly versed in the ways of the sordid world outside. It’s by nature of his upbringing. He might encounter disturbing and filthy things during cases, but that’s exactly it-- those are _cases_. Those aren’t people he knows. 

Dick’s grateful for that. But it means that he doesn’t-- understand. Tim had been a cute kid and has grown to be a conventionally attractive young man, but he’s not _gorgeous_. He’s handsome, but not _too_ handsome, or too pretty. Everyone in their family is blessed that way, with good looks, but no one else is-- no one else is like _Dick_. 

Sometimes he wonders if he has an aura that makes people see him as a fucktoy, similar to the way pigs and humans give off specific compounds during decomposition. Sexually speaking, maybe he produces some kind of pheromone where people want to fuck him. Do things to him. Hurt him. Unique and found only in him. 

Even when he’s not trying anything, even when he’s just existing, people come on to him. They always do. And they don’t seem to notice or care when he shifts awkwardly and deflects, and they get mad if he doesn’t accept their ‘compliments’. Waiting in line at the grocery store. Getting gas. Walking down the street. 

Sometimes people say things, sometimes they don’t. But he always feels the eyes. 

He’s glad Tim doesn’t have to deal with that. There’s such a thing as being… too wanted.

“... I’m not the best person to ask about this,” he says eventually. “Like, really not.” 

“I don’t know who _else_ to ask.” 

Dick thinks. Jason? Probably not. Jason by his own admission has gotten a lot of… _action_ , for lack of a better word, but that’s not what Tim’s talking about. He can’t imagine Jason sitting down to give hints on how to suavely charm the type of girl that attends Gotham Academy. Jason is… himself, and that’s his strongest characteristic. 

Dick? No way. He knows to entice people into having sex with him, and it never requires more than a glance and some nice words. His personal record is thirty seconds between meeting and a subsequent makeout. Five minutes between that and making the person come. But when it comes to building a lasting romantic connection with someone, or even holding a conversation that _doesn’t_ come with the subtext of sexual activity in the immediate future? That’s nearly impossible to imagine.

“Bruce,” he says finally. “Ask Bruce.” 

“Bruce is too busy.” 

“He is _not_. Have you asked?” 

“... No.” 

“Well then, come on.” 

Dick sets off toward the downstairs elevator. 

“I can ask him myself,” Tim mutters, but he follows anyway.

They enter the Batcave. Bruce isn’t alone. He’s sitting at the main computer, with Damian standing by his shoulder, and Jason’s off to one side in another chair, sharpening Batarangs. 

The scene is surprisingly harmonious. Everyone’s been making more of an effort to get along recently. That’s the only positive thing that’s come out of his recent spastic episodes. The three of them in a room together, no insults or arguing? Amazing.

But what are they working on? At Dick’s insistence, Damian is forbidden from the missing kids case, and everyone else knows it. They wouldn’t contradict him like that, especially now.

So it has to be something else.

“Something big?” Dick asks, as Bruce turns to look at him. 

“It’s… Calendar Man.” 

Even Bruce says his name with a bit of humor. And to be honest, the guy is a total joke. Dick could hardly ask for something less intensive for Damian to focus on. It might even be a bonding activity between him and Bruce.

“What about him?” 

Jason spins in his own computer chair, kicking his legs out as he does. 

“He has some fucking whacko plan for Mother’s Day apparently.” 

Damian chimes in, “I do not understand the purpose of focusing on a person of such little import.” 

“Meanwhile I just want to know who the fuck names themselves ‘Calendar Man’ with complete seriousness.” 

“Parental holidays are important,” is all Bruce says. And that shuts everyone up.

“I know this is going to get out anyway,” Tim says, “so I’m going to go ahead and say it. I have a date to prom. Her name is Odette.” 

“You mean Odette Asheton? Franklin Asheton’s daughter?”

Of course Bruce would immediately think of business connections-- Franklin Asheton owns a luxury shoe brand based out of Gotham. Dick actually has two pairs of Asheton dress shoes, and he’s sure Bruce has more.

Then Damian, with a scrunched up face, asks, “What is _prom_?” He says it as if _prom_ is something that’s on the end of his fork and still wiggling. 

“Like a gala,” Dick says, “but… for high school students.” 

“If that is the case, then why do you wish to attend, Drake? Galas are unfathomably awful.” 

“... I was not expecting this reaction,” Tim says. “I don’t know what I was expecting, but not this.” 

Jason, previously silent, spins in his chair again and focuses on Tim.

“What’s this chick’s story?” he says. 

And, again, it’s a sign of the progress this family has made during the… debacle… that Jason sounds civil, and that Tim responds with actual sincerity.

“She’s my age, she’s really nice and makes good jokes, we’re in multivariable calculus together…” 

“So she’s a giant nerd like you?” 

“She’s not a _nerd_ ,” Tim says. “She’s just smart. She’s also-- really pretty.” 

With that last bit he sends a hesitant glance to Dick, who suddenly feels like shit. Just because _he_ can’t handle compliments on his physical appearance doesn’t mean that everyone is forbidden forever from thinking someone else is attractive.

“There’s nothing wrong with thinking she’s pretty,” he says. “Just as long as that-- that’s not _all_ you like about her.” 

“It’s periphery,” Tim clarifies.

Dick goes to sit in another of the chairs, and Damian immediately comes to his side. It’s endearing. 

“Well,” Bruce says, “congratulations. I remember my first prom.” 

“That’s weird to think about,” Tim says. “Really weird. I can’t imagine you as a high schooler.” 

Dick has known Bruce since the man was 23. That’s not too far from high school-- still college-age. But he remembers that the others don’t have that length of perspective. Even Jason has known him less than a decade. But Dick? Dick had come along shortly after Bruce had become Batman, and they’d grown into their roles together.

“Yes,” Bruce says. “At one point in time I was in fact a child, and I even went to _school_. This was before motorized vehicles, or electricity, of course.” 

“That’s why you’re not a good reference,” Jason says. “You’re too old-fashioned. People don’t pull out chairs any more, or bow, or do any of that other antiquated shit I’m sure Alfie taught you.” 

“Why not?” Bruce says. “The women I’ve dated have appreciated it.” 

“That’s because they’re all middle-aged and rich as fuck.”

“I’m 41,” Bruce says. “Is that middle-aged now?” 

“You have until 45,” Dick says. “Then I think it starts.” 

“Yeah,” Jason says. “Once you hit that, we’re required to put you out on one of those icebergs like the Eskimo do with their old people. Let you flow out to sea and be eaten by a polar bear.” 

“I feel flattered. At least I’ll provide sustenance to an endangered animal.” 

“It is inaccurate,” Damian says. “Father, if you were to be eaten by any Arctic creature in that situation, it would most likely be a harp seal. You would die of exposure within hours of being set adrift and thereafter the seals would commence their feast.” 

“That’s more comforting than the prospect of being eaten alive by a bear,” Bruce says. “Thanks, Damian.” 

Damian wiggles with joy-- not that any of the others see it. Dick does, and he’s internally thankful to Bruce for playing along with this silly game.

Tim says, “Can we stop talking about committing senicide four years from now?” 

“Fine,” Jason says. “But Bruce has to stop acting like he’s Gregory Peck.” 

“I think he’d be more of a Cary Grant,” Dick says. 

“Oh my _god_ ,” Tim says, “this is already agonizing enough. Can we _not_?” 

“Sorry Timmers.” 

“ _Don’t_ introduce yourself as ‘Timmers’,” Jason says. “Or ‘Timmy’. Tim is just fine.” 

“She already knows my name. _I asked her out_.” 

"Oh, okay then, you're practically married."

“Back to the topic at hand,” Bruce says, “we’re all glad you’re getting to experience this seminal part of youth--” 

Jason snorts at the phrasing and Bruce shoots him a stern glance.

“--but I’m at a loss as to why you made it an announcement.”

Tim finally sinks down into a chair as well. 

“Because,” he says, “I don’t know what to _do_.” 

“You don’t have to do anything,” Bruce says, “except show up and enjoy the time with Odette.” 

“No,” Tim says. “It’s not that simple. Do I pick her up or meet her there? If I pick her up do I open the door for her? What do we talk about on the way there? If I meet her there then do we meet at the entrance or inside? What kind of flowers do I give her? Do people still give flowers, or is that cliché now?”

Tim is clutching his hair again, and he’s slumped in the computer chair. 

“You fucking people,” Jason says. “I don’t know how any of you make it in general society.”

“What?” 

“All of you interact so weirdly with the world.”

It’s… true, honestly. 

This life, their life, is different from what ordinary people experience. Dick remembers just enough of his time before Bruce to know the difference. Their family is sheltered from the interference of others, and the inconveniences of life, and many of the rules and regulations others have to put up with. It’s a different tier of living. People accommodate and agree and watch their tongues; there’s always a massive differential in terms of social power. And coming down from that, to the regular plane of existence, is… hard.

Dick had felt it when he’d become a police officer and separated himself from being known only as Bruce Wayne’s son. Suddenly everyday people were bold, saying their opinions bluntly in plain contrast to his own, and treating him no differently than they did anyone else. It makes him sound a little spoiled, but he’d been-- surprised, at first, at the difference. Not angry, and not indignant, but surprised. Life outside the manor --the _regular_ life, without butlers and billions of dollars-- was so different it might as well have been another world. 

Now that he’s come back to live here full-time, he’s realized the juxtaposition even more. And it’s spoiled, too, that he’s even thinking this, but--

Right now, with the things that have happened… he couldn’t manage if he had to live a truly normal life. He just couldn’t. Even when he’d been "on his own” in Bludhaven, Bruce was just a phone call away, ready to save him from himself if he fucked up, and Alfred checked on him at least weekly. There was always that support, that safety net. Bruce might have disagreed with him, but he’d never, _ever_ let his son have anything less than the best. Hence the apartment Alfred had insisted on, with a doorman and such nice amenities, while his co-workers survived on a government worker’s salary and worried about saving for a down payment on a used car.

And that’s it. Those are the facts. If he were having to hold down a regular job, if he had to worry about bills and housing and all the rest… he wouldn’t be able to survive. He’s barely hanging on as it is. He can’t imagine having to keep it all together, in that way, too. 

Neither he, nor Tim, or Damian or Jason, will ever have to work if they don’t _wish_ to. Bruce’s money is a perpetual machine, producing more just from passive investments than they could hope to ever spend. And aside from that, Bruce’s own wealth, Bruce has dedicated to them their own accounts, funded generously and without condition. 

But that-- that’s a resource that the vast majority of the population don’t have access to. Sure, Bruce funds mental health clinics and crisis centers and halfway houses and soup kitchens and all sorts of things meant to mitigate the pain of poverty and disadvantage, but… those are stopgaps. Regular people don’t have the luxury that he has, of knowing that everything external has always been and will always be taken care of. 

And what does that mean about him? 

He’s even more pathetic, really. He has _all_ these advantages, all these people ready to help him if he so much as opens his mouth, but he still-- he still--

He still allows what happened to fuck with him. He still lets himself be this weak. He still is exactly who he is. 

It’s awful. 

He's awful.

“What do you think?” someone asks. 

Dick realizes that everyone is staring at him. The question must have been meant for him, because the conversation has stopped entirely.

“... Can you repeat the question?” he says. 

Bruce shares a look with Tim and Jason. Damian, at his side, is now touching his arm. It’s so uncharacteristic for the boy to do, especially in front of others.

He wonders how long he’s been-- _out_. Jason’s done with the entire stock of Batarangs he’d been sharpening, and at some point Damian had pulled a chair up to sit beside him.

“Vest versus cummerbund,” Tim says. “What’s your take?”

That can’t have been what they were talking about. They must have asked him about something that actually mattered, and when he hadn’t responded… that eye contact the three of them had shared, and the way Damian had touched his arm-- 

Well.

They’d decided he wasn’t fit for that.

“I don’t know,” Dick says. “I really don’t know.” 

And it’s the truth.

He doesn’t know anything any more. How to act, how to keep it together, how to pay fucking attention to a conversation--

He doesn’t know.

People say ignorance is bliss, but if this-- if this is ignorance, then he wants to know everything there ever fucking was.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Small note: I know that in canon Bruce adopted Dick after he spent time in a juvenile detention center, but my lil' ol' heart just couldn't take that in this fic. Dick's already suffering enough, so in this 'verse he got to go home with suddenly, weirdly parental Bruce due to Jim being all for it. 
> 
> Thank for reading, and I love hearing from y'all about your thoughts on each chapter. <3


	3. What Pretension, Everlasting Peace

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Dick and Jason move on with identification of the recently found bodies. A clue is uncovered. Damian discovers a new word. And what pretension-- the concept of everlasting peace.

All in all, there had been eleven bodies in the basement of the old coffin factory, in various stages of decomposition. 

Two of them had been ‘fresh’ enough that the coroner’s office was able to determine cause of death. They’d been right in their initial suspicions-- blunt force trauma to the head, chest, and abdomen. One had died from a fractured skull, the other of intra-abdominal hemorrhaging. The rest had been too skeletonized to know for sure, but given the context, it’s reasonable to assume that they’d died from blunt force trauma as well. 

They’re still trying to ID the victims, and Jim’s leaning on them for that. He’s given them the information that GCPD has, and it’s up to them to turn that into definitive answers.

Hard to do when the kids aren’t reported missing in the first place. 

But they have a lead. It's small, something that might not be useful in the long run, but it’s still _a_ lead.

In one of the victims’ pockets, they’d found a key chain for a defunct Gotham City sports team, one that had disbanded ten years ago. The Gotham NightHawks, a hockey team that, according to internet records, had been only mildly successful, hence its dissolution. No reason for teenagers to be interested in something like that and besides, the chain’s clasp had been broken in half, torn away from whatever it had been attached to-- perhaps the killer’s wallet, or car keys. 

Maybe the victim had, despite their terror, had enough presence of mind to take it, hoping that it would help identify their murderer. If they’d been struggling senselessly and managed to grab it without thinking, it doesn’t make sense that they’d have taken the time to shove it into their pocket. 

No. 

A ray of thought from that unidentified girl, in the past, beaming toward them now--

 _Here’s a clue_.

Dick’s going to do his best to honor that thought, and that girl, and all the others. 

He and Jason are sitting at a table down in the Cave, the case papers spread before them. They both have laptops open but they’re pushed to the side.

Right now, they have a profile to make.

“He used it as a dumping ground, and it seems to have worked-- so why the others, closer into the city?” 

“Maybe the fucker didn’t have a car during those periods. Asked them to go somewhere ‘private’ nearby, within walking distance.”

Makes sense.

“He’s got to be offering more money than the rest,” Dick says. “Why else would they agree to go with him in a car when there’s plenty of people willing to do it right there?” 

“Get ‘em high first, and they won’t notice.”

The killer has to be an adult man. It nearly always is, with serial killings, especially with ones so violent as these. And, besides…

“He's got to be strong to leave those kinds of fractures on the victims,” Dick says. 

“And to get them into the factory itself once he’d killed them.”

“You don’t think they went in with him willingly?” 

“Would _you_ follow a stranger into the basement of a derelict factory for $50?”

Dick doesn’t answer that.

The money-- never been involved with him. That’s not how he _works_. And he’s cognizant of how others feel about it, and that they’d disapprove mightily, but if it led to a break in the case-- 

He really probably would.

“Maybe one or two did,” Jason continues, “but I’d lay money that he kills them somewhere else, and then disposes of them there.” 

GCPD had spoken to the property management. It was in what seemed to be permanent foreclosure, owned by a bank that couldn’t sell it. There were no cameras at the gates, and that makes sense, because there was nothing of value to be taken, and they’d already done their due diligence by boarding the place up and ensuring that the fencing was secure.

But the chains on the side gate-- there had been two padlocks. 

It’s common in properties that have multiple people who need to access it. The locks are each attached to an end link in the chain, and they latch onto each other in the middle. Thus, either person can gain access to the property without shutting the other out.

The second lock had to be the killer’s. It was smart. He must have simply cut a chain out, put his lock on, and interlinked it with the bank’s. No one would notice, especially since it was a side gate, and then he’d have access to the property as he pleased. 

Gordon had ordered the property to be set under surveillance, but that nothing external be disturbed. Many serial killers revisit burial sites or dumping grounds, and they knew that this killer had returned to the site many times over the years to dispose of each subsequent body. If they could apprehend someone as they entered the site, _especially_ if they opened the gate--

That was probably their killer.

Gordon had also mandated that the investigation was to remain confidential. If they revealed the details, finding 11 bodies at once, it would be a media storm, and the killer would be spooked. He’d never return to the factory. 

It’s like hunting a wild animal, having to think the way these murderers do. Where they’d hide, what they’d do, how they’d go about it…

And then there are the identifications of the kids. It’s secondary to the case itself. It’s harsh, so harsh to acknowledge, but the identities don’t matter much. In these sorts of cases, the victims are chosen at random and have no connection to the killer.

But-- they do matter. To him. 

Each victim had a life and a story. Likes and dislikes, fears and hopes, favorite colors and foods. It’s easy to get immured by the darkness and numb oneself to the fact that these were actual _people_ , and maybe he’d be better off if he could isolate himself like that, the way Tim and Bruce do, but that’s not him. It’s never been him. And he owes it to these kids, the ones society left behind, to at least ensure their names are known.

“Well,” he says, “we’ve got twelve identities to work on while they’re staking out the property. That’s something.”

“I’ll do it,” Jason says, so quickly that he has to have thought about it in advance. It raises Dick’s guard by default. 

“That’s too much,” Dick says. “ _Twelve_ by yourself? You’ll never get it done. Let’s split it.” 

“Nah,” Jason says. “I’ll do it. I’m more familiar with the system bullshit anyway, and what goes on with these kinds of kids.” 

“That’s overwhelming. You shouldn’t have to do it all.” 

“Just let me do it.” 

“I’ve got literally nothing else happening in my life. Plenty of time to help.” 

“No,” Jason replies mulishly.

“Why the hell not?” 

“You looking up these kids isn’t gonna help what's going on with you.” 

“You think I can’t do my job?” 

“I’m sure you could do it damn fine,” Jason says, not rising to the bait. “That’s not the issue. Remember what we talked about? Pulling back?” 

“So I’m too _emotional_ , is that it? Too _affected_?” 

“Goddammit, Dick, I’m not trying to have an argument with you.”

That’s true. Jason isn’t subtle when he starts confrontations; he goes from nothing to _everything_ in just a moment. This slow building of his exasperation-- it’s clear that he’s not angry. 

“But that’s what it is. You think I’m not strong enough to handle it.” 

“Fuck,” Jason says, “you know that’s not it. It’s just-- you’re not seeing the situation clearly.” 

“That’s right, I can’t, because I’m too emotional and weak. So why don’t you explain it?” 

Jason gives a big, big sigh, and starts gathering up the papers. It’s a display of conscious restraint that, in another situation, Dick would be astonished by. But right now, it’s just--

Fucking irritating. 

“Go ahead. Tell me all about how I’m too fucked up to do anything useful.” 

Jason still doesn’t say anything. He sticks the papers back into their folders and clicks away whatever was on his laptop before putting it to sleep and sliding it into its sleeve. 

“... I’m trying really hard not to get frustrated,” he says once he’s done. “So if you would stop twisting everything I say into an insult about yourself, that would be fuckin’ fantastic.”

“I wouldn’t be _twisting_ everything if you said what the fuck you actually mean.” 

“You want me to be blunt, is that it?” 

“Yes, just fucking _tell_ me.” 

Jason seems to think for a second. It’s bizarre. He never _thinks_ about what he says. He says it with confidence and assurance.

“Fine,” he says. “I don’t want to be an asshole, but fine. You’re right; I don’t want you to do this ID shit. I don’t think you can handle it. Not because you’re weak or whatever the fuck, but because you’ve already got shit going on that deserves your attention more.” 

“Like _what_ ,” Dick spits. 

“Have you looked in the mirror lately?” 

“Yeah, and I fucking hate myself because I look like a whore.”

Jason’s expression drops into a bit of shock. Dick keeps going. If he tramples that sentence into the past by saying something even more outrageous, then maybe it’ll be like he never said that. Because that-- 

He’s never discussed that with anyone. How he’s handsome, so that means it’s his fault. 

“But I don’t have anything wrong with me,” he continues. “I’m perfectly fine.” 

An outright lie, one that he hopes will distract Jason into fighting him about it, instead of dissecting what he’d said previously. 

And Jason falls for it, thank god.

“Bull fucking _shit_ you don’t have anything wrong with you. And if you want tangible evidence, weigh yourself.” 

Dick’s never had a habit of weighing himself, and he’s certainly not going to do it now, when it would only provide proof that Jason is right, and that he’s neglecting his body.

He plays dumb again. 

“What?”

“You know what I mean. This weight loss isn’t natural for you.”

“My BMI is _fine_ ,” Dick says. 

“Argue however you want, but the reality is that if you keep dropping weight, you’re gonna be a liability in the field.” 

Leslie had said he’d lost ten pounds. He’s sure he’s lost more since then. His daily caloric expenditure is around 3,000 calories-- that’s what he needs to consume per day, just to maintain his weight. It comes with his level of activity. And he’s not taking in anything near that. 

He knows it’s a problem. And the worst part is that he _doesn’t care_ , except in that Jason’s right; it’s affecting his ability to be Nightwing. 

Blueberries: less than 100 calories a cup. Dark chocolate: 350 calories a bar. That’s what he manages to eat nowadays. Alfred insists that he drink Gatorade or something similar, but that’s purely sugar-based calories. And the nutrition drinks-- he can barely touch those. 

A pound is 3500 calories. 

Half a pound a day.

That’s probably what he’s losing. Not to mention the lack of protein-- his body is literally _eating_ his own muscle because he doesn’t have enough fat to burn first.

What a fucking joke. How can he think he’s going to maintain fighting fitness when he’s depriving himself of everything his body needs to stay strong?

How can he stay useful if he can’t even fight?

The answer to that has always been sex, of course. 

Not that they’d ever allow it, especially now. But if they don’t know…

“I can tell you’re thinking of something fucking stupid,” Jason says, “so stop it. I just-- Jesus, Dick, do you know how hard it is to _watch_ you do this shit to yourself?” 

“What shit?” 

“You’re either in total denial or you’re being obtuse on purpose just to frustrate me. So which one is it?” 

Okay, so maybe Jason hadn’t fallen for it as much as he’d thought. And now, at this dichotomy, he doesn’t know what to say. 

“Listen. Let me take this one. It's what brothers do.” 

“Brothers,” Dick repeats. 

“Yeah,” Jason says. “You’ve always been a pain in the ass, but you’re my brother. And we gotta take care of each other.” 

This kindness, this consideration. Jason’s always had this hidden under his wings, tucked away where no one could find and abuse it.

And Dick’s disregarding it, even as it’s being plainly offered.

He’s terrible.

“Alright,” Dick says. “You can do the IDs. But if you need help--”

“If I need help, I’ll let you know.” 

“Promise?” 

Jason smiles at him wryly and says, “Yeah, promise.” 

Somehow it feels a little false, but Dick accepts it anyway.

He can’t keep turning down care when it’s offered. 

Eventually-- 

Won’t people stop giving it?

* * *

The first week in May goes by quickly, and Mother’s Day comes around.

Bruce, Tim, and Damian manage to foil Calendar Man’s plot to… do whatever it was he had planned. Tim had tried to explain it, but it had been so idiotic that, without putting his own eyes on the case file, Dick hadn’t been able to comprehend it. He’s glad that they had an easy time, and proud of Damian for working with others so well. 

That Monday, when Damian gets home from school, he pops by his room. The boy is at his desk, which would lead normal people to think he’s doing schoolwork, but Dick knows better.

“Dami,” he says, “how would you like to have a spontaneous adventure that, simultaneously, I have planned to the last detail?”

Damian looks up from his sketchbook. He’s drawing Alfred, who’s sprawled on the floor a few feet away, neatly parceled into a square of sunlight coming in from the French doors that lead out onto the balcony.

“Do go on,” he drawls, sounding unenthused, but Dick knows better about that, too.

“Remember Sylvia. The snake from last weekend.” 

“As I am not currently experiencing any condition that would lead to memory loss, I must inform you that indeed, I do recall Sylvia, ‘the snake from last weekend’.” 

Dick enters the room and sits down on the floor beside Alfred. 

“Smart-aleck,” he says, without sass. “I was thinking and-- if you want, we can get you your very own Sylvia.” 

“There can only be one Sylvia,” Damian says, with a completely straight face. 

“Well,” Dick flounders, “a different one. How would you like a snake, in general? A pet shnek.”

"A shnek," Damian says.

"Yes, a shnek."

"I consider myself to be quite fluent in English," Damian says, "and yet I have never heard the word 'shnek'."

"That's what my mom and I called them. Shneks. It's more fun than saying 'snake'. You really put the 'sh' into it. Shhhhnek."

"Shnek," Damian says, looking perturbed.

"More emphasis on the first part."

"Shhhhnek."

"You're getting there."

Damian glances at him sideways, then leaves the desk to come sit across from Dick on the floor. He pets Alfred, and the cat turns to him and begins to purr.

“How do you know that Pennyworth permits serpents in the Manor?” 

"I bullied them into letting me have an iguana when I was, like, nine. His name was Mr. Iguana.” 

Mr. Iguana wasn’t the best example. First, his name was _Mr. Iguana_ (come to think of it, who was he to criticize ‘Plantita’?), and second, he’d met... an untimely fate. But, the fact still stood that Bruce and Alfred had watched on, slightly horrified yet tolerant, as Dick let his newly acquired lizard roam the house. Alfred hadn’t even said anything when he’d found iguana poop on the foyer floor. 

“Sometimes I let him wander around the Manor,” Dick says. “I tied a balloon on a string to him so we could see where he’d gone.” 

"This is fascinating," Damian says drolly, “but I fail to understand the intersection between this story and that of a potential… shnek.” 

“Eh,” Dick says, “well, he slipped the balloon and disappeared after a little while. Alfred found him stuck under the dryer. I think he liked the heat and… couldn’t get out.” 

"Oh," Damian says. "That is... quite morbid."

"Yeah. I remember Alfred and Bruce trying to tell me that he'd escaped outside and would live happily ever after, but even then I knew better."

"That explanation makes no sense regardless," Damian says. "We live in New Jersey. An iguana would never survive the winter outdoors."

"I don't think they thought that far,” Dick says.

In retrospect he’s supremely amused by the image of Bruce and Alfred frantically whispering potential excuses to each other, probably in the linen closet next to the washing machine, the door closed and voices hushed so that Dick wouldn’t pass by and hear them.

Maybe they’d thought they could just buy another one, the way parents did with replacement goldfish, although in truth-- both of them had been creeped out by Mr. Iguana, so they were probably relieved for him to have taken… an unfortunate turn. They’d never have forced him to get rid of the lizard, of course, and they’d given into Dick’s pleading for him with little fuss in the first place, but… he remembers Bruce’s forced smile when he’d set Mr. Iguana on his shoulder, and how the man had winced when the lizard crawled down his arm. He’d battle mutated crocodile men in Gotham’s nastiest places, but a lizard’s scaly skin brushing against his neck and sharp nails piercing through his dress shirt? Too much.

It’s funny, and also…

Bruce loves him so much. He forgets it sometimes, in his bitterness, but Bruce would do anything for him, and he knows it. It’s an unending security.

He hopes Damian feels that way about him. Hopes he knows that he’ll do _everything_ , unto the end of the earth, to keep him happy and safe. 

"Anyway," Dick says, "the entire point of me even mentioning Mr. Iguana is that if they let me get away with having a giant lizard crawling around the Manor, I don't think they'll care about a shnek that stays in your room.” 

"But," Damian says.

"But..."

"I am not you," he says, after a pause. "They are not obligated to tolerate my idiosyncrasies and flights of fancy.” 

Dick takes a moment to process, really process, what Damian's saying. And even when he does think he has it-- well, there's no way Damian can actually believe that, right? Right?

_I am not you._

That's right; Damian's not him. He's infinitely smarter, so much more capable, with the potential to grow and surpass everything Dick might ever have been. And yet Damian's saying it like it's something horrible. Like it sets him apart in a negative way. Like he thinks...

Like he thinks that...

"Do you think they don't like you?"

"I don't _think_ it," Damian says, with a special sort of emphasis. 

Dick's overwhelmed with a sudden desire to reach out, clutch the boy to his chest, run his hands through his recently cut black hair. To show how much he's loved, and how worth _everything_ he is, and how there's nothing he needs to worry about-- how he could never be anything other than utterly lovable, and cherished, and cared for deeply by each person that comes into contact with him. He's so special, so unique-- all his funny ways of viewing the world and his dry humor that others never catch, because they--

They don't see Damian in the same way.

"Fuck," Dick says. 

“I seem to recall your insistence that using curse words is a ‘bad example’.”

“Fuck,” Dick says again, and Damian’s looking at him now, truly looking at him, and Dick has to rein himself back in. 

He tries to channel Leslie, or Barbara. They’re such good examples in regards to having sensitive conversations. Not because they’re women and all that bullshit about how they ‘communicate better’, but because they come from _outside_ this fucked-up little family, and they grew in lands where hurt and trauma and dedication to a single cause weren’t the only things people shared.

“It isn’t the example I want to set,” he says, “and I’m trying to curtail it. But-- Dami, what do you mean that you don’t _think_ it?” 

“I _don’t_ think it,” Damian says. “I know that they don’t hold a great deal of affection for me.” 

“Who is ‘they’?” 

Dick already knows. And why the fuck hasn’t he-- why hasn’t he _done_ something about this before? 

“Father, and Drake, and Todd. I suppose that Pennyworth is too professional to harbor personal ill will toward me.” 

“ _None_ of them hold ill will toward you,” Dick says quickly. 

And that’s true. None of the people he just mentioned would ever want to hurt him in a serious way. Not now, with Jason recovered from his insanity and Tim less bitter and Bruce back. Things have always been difficult, but interpersonal relationships in the family have gotten better since his freakout. He’s noted it before and he’ll note it again. He’s grateful. Jason’s been over more often, and he and Bruce haven’t had a huge fight (to his knowledge, at least) since before they got Dami back, and Tim is opening up about his usually very secretive private life, and his anxiety over the prom with Odette, but...

Damian continues to cling to him, as if he’s his only landmark in a sea of directionless devastation. Sure, he’ll be in the same room with the rest of the family, and participate in conversation a little, but… it’s only alone with Dick that Damian glows, and grows, and comes out of his own shadow.

He deserves to be feel comfortable like that with everyone.

“I don’t wish you to explain things to me as if I’m a child,” Damian says. 

“I know that’s frustrating,” Dick says. “I’ll try not to condescend, and tell me if it feels like I’m doing it.” 

He’s not going to argue the point about whether or not Dami is a child. He knows all too well the resistance that comes with it. When he’d been young, he’d refused to hear it, again and again, and even with this case, all those kids whose bones were still growing and whose lives hadn’t yet really begun...

It’s hard to think of himself as a child in that sort of environment. With Slade. Everything. Because that makes it all so much more-- _horrible_ , doesn’t it? 

“First off,” Dick says, “I love you.” 

Damian’s face shifts like he doesn’t want to accept it. 

“Love is a nebulous concept spouted by those who attempt to reconcile biological--”

“I love you,” he repeats. “I love you, more than anything.”

“Humans love _themselves_ more than anything.” 

And Damian has every reason to believe that. 

“Damian,” he says. “Look at me.” 

He does. His face, so similar to Bruce’s in structure, is earnest but guarded. It’s devastating, that even here, with Dick, he feels the need to keep a part of himself closed off like this. 

He can’t dance around this situation like he does with his own time with Slade. The meaningless terms of _going away_ and _coming back_ \-- the things he uses to refer to his own captivity-- those aren’t good enough. Dami has to know that there’s proper words he can use to describe what happened to him, because without that terminology-- without words to explain, and without the bravery to use them, then there’s no truth at all.

… How can you get better from something when you don’t even know what it is?

“When you were captured,” Dick begins.

Damian’s attention is all on him, all at once. 

“I apologize--” he begins preemptively.

“No,” Dick says. “No, save your replies and you can give them to me in a little bit. I need to say this. And if I don’t say it in one go, I don’t think I’ll be able to at all.” 

“Certainly,” Damian says, as if he understands it, but his expression is so _confused_.

“When you were captured by Slade-- don’t apologize for it. I understand why you went. You love me, and you hate to think of me being hurt, right?” 

“Yes.” 

“So you were willing to do whatever you thought it took to keep me safe, or to avenge me. And so you went to Slade to try to do that.”

“... Yes,” Damian says again, more hesitantly this time.

“And due to no fault of your own, because you’re _twelve_ and he’s a fucking monster, you got captured. And even if you weren’t twelve, it still wouldn’t be your fault. God, Dami, none of that is _your fault_. People doing fucked up things to you _isn’t your fault_.”

This feels like some Good Will Hunting bullshit. The scene with Robin Williams and Matt Damon both hugging each other and crying. What a fantasy. Telling someone it’s ‘not their fault’ doesn’t make them feel any less guilty. But even with how much he hates that scene, and how fucking stupid he’s always thought it was, he’s still saying it now, because Damian deserves it.

“People like him are fucking monsters. I’m still terrified of him. Even now that he’s dead.”

And-- this isn’t Good Will Hunting, or a movie at all, some stupid fucking blockbuster or sleeper indie hit, so Damian doesn’t react to that with childish wonder. They’ve all been afraid, afraid for their lives and sanity, and maybe in a ‘normal’ family a child would be surprised to hear that their parental figure is frightened of something, but this-- 

Ha. No.

“And even though I was terrified of him-- could barely stand to think of him and what he did to me--” 

\-- and he’s not going to be a hypocrite, he’s _not going to do it_ , he’s not going to sugarcoat things and censor himself. These things need to have _words_ because if something happens to Damian in the future, then he needs to know Dick himself is brave enough to say it, and that saying it isn't _wrong_ , and--

“He beat me, and called it training. He made me do terrible things, played mind games. And-- he raped me every fucking day. But even that, even with _all_ that, I would have traded myself for you in a heartbeat if that was what it took to keep you safe. And I wouldn’t have regretted it one bit.” 

“... I don’t comprehend your reasoning,” Damian says.

“It’s love,” Dick says. “What I feel for you-- it’s the same as what you feel for me. I want to protect you, and keep you safe and happy, and I want you to have everything in the _world_ , Dami, because _I love you_.” 

He’s inches from saying what can never be taken back-- from stealing Bruce’s place entirely, and saying that Damian is _his_ son, and that he won’t let him go for anything, when Damian says--

“Father does not love me.” 

And it’s crushing, because Dick _wants to be_ his father. He already is, in so many ways; in the past his friends had joked about it, saying that he was ‘raising a demon’, and maybe he’d laughed it off then, while thinking internally that Damian wasn’t a demon, and that raising him wasn’t so bad, but… even when he and Bruce had had that conversation on the porch, the day after they got Damian back, there had been no words. Slight acknowledgements, yes, but--

Again. Words are the only way that a situation gains truth. 

“Bruce wants to love you,” Dick says. “He does. I wouldn’t lie to you about that. But-- and understand me here, it’s _not your fault_ , but it’s not his fault either. Talia did terrible things to him.” 

“In order to… acquire me.” 

“For you to be born,” he corrects. “And yes, she raped him, and that’s on _her_. Maybe if Bruce were different, or the situation different, your relationship would be different, too. But trust me when I say that you’re important to him, and he doesn’t want you _gone_ , and he’s glad you’re here with us now.” 

“His reasons for his aversion are understandable, but Mother created me, and yet she--” 

Yet she still dropped him off here, with no more than a ‘by your leave’. Still tried to _kill_ him because he was a ‘disappointment’. She raised him so _meanly_ , without a hint of nurturing or affection besides that which her own ego would permit, and maybe there’s something there, in that situation, between her and Ra’s, that speaks of her own abuse by him, but he’s not kind enough to give her that sympathy. 

“She… has never professed to love me, either.” 

“Talia is a fucking _cunt_ ,” Dick spits, and he’s shocked at himself for the degree of language he’s just used. Sexism, and unkind words to women-- whatever the fuck. He’s never said it before, but that word--

It seems to fit so well. And he’s not sorry.

Talia’s trash. She’s worse than trash. Dick wishes he had his hands around her neck. And he’d squeeze, and squeeze, and she’d scrabble at his arms and try to break away but no, he’d never let her escape. She’d _pay_ for everything that she’s done to Bruce, that degree of betrayal and abuse and horror, and she’d pay even more for what she’s done to Damian. This child who in spite of everything is _trying_. Trying to be, to exist, to discover himself in a world that’s done nothing but fuck him over. 

It makes him so angry. Maybe this is what Jason deals with during his rages. He’s got to be careful or it’s going to spill over and Dami will think it’s directed at him.

Never at him. 

Never _to_ him. 

He’d always thought, secretly, that Bruce had been lying when he said things like, “There’s nothing you could do to make me stop loving you.” And now-- now that Bruce _knows_ , knows all those filthy festering things Dick had let rot away in his very own basement-- he’s still not turned his back, and Dick understands. Dick is Bruce’s child, just like Damian is Dick’s child. 

The way he feels toward Talia-- does Bruce feel that way about Slade? 

“I still feel… a degree of affection for her,” Damian says. “She was not entirely abusive to me. She protected me from Grandfather’s most severe punishment ideas.” 

Oh, congratulations to Talia. Doing the shit mothers and fathers are _supposed_ to do in the first place. She deserves a fucking medal. 

A fucking piece of metal to the head.

He takes several deep breaths and covers it under the guise of petting Alfred. 

“You know people can be irrational,” Dick says, once he’s calmed down, "and feelings can’t be quantified or ordered around. And… we all have a desire to love our parents, even if they don’t… do best by us.”

“She trained me well,” Damian replies, as if that’s the only scenario in which he can picture a parent ‘doing best by’ their child.

“There are so many other aspects to parenthood, and to being someone’s child,” Dick says. “And you deserve to experience all of them.” 

He’s got to say it. He can’t be afraid of this any longer. These feelings, this love… it’s uncontainable. 

“Dami,” he says. “This-- and _please_ tell me if it feels like an overstep, but I--” 

“I love you as well,” Damian says, and it seems as though he’s falsely predicted what Dick had been about to say. Dick’s just enough of a coward to consider using that as an out, to make his statement just another ‘ _I love you_ ’, but-- no. 

“I see you as my son. Or the closest thing I’ll ever have to one. Maybe biologically, you’re not, but in every other way, in all the ways that matter--”

He realizes that he’s rambling, and that Damian is staring at him with big eyes and an emotionless face. 

“But,” he says, and it feels like slitting his own throat, “you don’t have to reciprocate my feelings. You have a choice.” 

Damian’s still silent.

Tears are starting to form in his eyes. He blinks them back and looks away, using his hand to tickle Alfred’s stomach. The cat hates it, and, predictably, begins to claw and bite at his fingers. The pain distracts him. It’s something he can concentrate on.

And then Damian’s voice speaks out.

“If it were possible to _choose_ a father,” he says slowly, “I believe that I would choose you.” 

Dick can’t help it. 

He starts to cry, and Alfred is generous enough to let go of his hand. He uses it to wipe the tears away, and now Dami’s scooted close enough to him that he can see deep into his eyes, and the boy--

He’s crying, too.

“Father is my biological _father_ , but you-- you are what, colloquially, is a ‘dad’.” 

Dick laughs through his tears, and then Dami’s hugging him, and he says into his ear, “Sssshnek,” with the exaggerated pronunciation that Mary Grayson always had. 

“Perfect,” Dick laughs again, and he sees Dami smiling too.

* * *

The next afternoon, after the rush hour has died down, Dick goes to the pet store-- a local, ethical one that specializes in reptiles. It comes with an animal welfare stamp of approval, and deals only in captive-bred animals. Damian would object otherwise, and it’s not like Dick wants to be a shitty person and support bad businesses. 

He’d figured it was best to do research in person rather than pulling a Tim and learning snake care off Youtube. You can mess up the installation of a door without too much consequence, but mess up the care of a living thing? It usually turns out like, well, Mr. Iguana. 

Besides, the news always claims that local businesses are dying and Gotham is hard enough to stay afloat in. He’ll spend his money-- _Bruce’s_ money-- where it’ll do the most good. This is a nice shop, and its animals seem to be well cared-for, so if he can make a purchase from them, all the better. 

It’s just… such a large place, and there are so many things, and he’s never been here before. He hasn’t gone anywhere new since… before he turned 25, actually. He’d been burned the week after his birthday, and since he’s eased himself back into public, he’s stuck with small places that he’s already familiar with, and whose employees aren’t likely to get over-excited by seeing him. The little ice cream shop Damian loves, for instance, and the independent bookstore he’s gone to since he was a child. Even the other pet store, the one he’d gotten the animals’ treats from, was a place he’d been in before.

This is entirely new, and he feels anxious, which is ridiculous, because he’s fucking _Nightwing_ and is getting sweaty about going into a store. When the clerk tells him, “Welcome to Reptile Resort,” he averts his face and gives a quiet, “Hello,” in return.

This is a standard situation that people face in everyday life. If he can’t manage going into a shop, then how fucked up is he? He’d been right to think he couldn’t handle being ‘normal’, if this is all it takes to set him off. 

He wanders the aisles a couple of times and ends up in the iguana section. They’re all in separate habitats, and one of them seems to be staring at him balefully. Maybe it’s Mr. Iguana’s great-great-great-great grandchild. And as a matter of fact-- had Mr. Iguana actually been a ‘mister’ or had he been female? How did you tell the difference?

With the anoles that he and Damian had caught last week, there’d been something in the field guide about frills and orange colors but, when it comes to iguanas, who knows? He thinks back to his other memories that feature Mr. (Ms.? Mrs.?) Iguana, and he can’t remember anything other than his glee at his new pet. Alfred would probably remember its sex, if he asked, because Alfred knows everything. 

“Can I help you find something?” 

Dick doesn’t jump because he’s got the reflexes and situational awareness to prevent it. But still, the voice, interrupting his reminiscence upon Mr. Iguana and his fateful demise--

It’s enough to jolt him, a little bit. He turns around and sees a store employee, probably a college student, dressed in a shirt that says _Reptile Resort_. The young woman’s standard ‘customer service’ smile drops like a fly when she realizes who he is, and Dick braces himself.

“Oh,” she says, “oh, you’re-- Dick Grayson, right?” 

“That’s me,” he says, hoping he sounds casual. 

What the fuck is wrong with him? Why is his heart racing? 

“Wow,” she says. “You’re handsome in photos, but in person-- wow.” 

What does he say to that? If he acknowledges it, because it’s true and he _is_ gorgeous, then it’ll make him sound like a narcissistic asshole. If he tries to brush it aside and say something disparaging about himself, it’s like he’s negating his own existence. 

Why can’t people just leave him the fuck alone? 

This girl might take a picture of him, upload it to any social media she wants. Whatever, it comes with being a public figure. But right now, someone will probably comment on his weight loss, and speculate that he’s become anorexic or has cancer or any other ridiculous thing. And then they’ll wonder why Dick Grayson was at a pet store. Cue the jokes about handling snakes and how people would gladly show him _their_ anaconda.

Disgusting. He tries to avoid seeing those sorts of things, those comments about him, but every so often it pops up just when he’s surfing the internet. And it’s ridiculous because he’s famous literally only for being Bruce’s son. He’s done nothing to make people be so obsessed with him.

Nothing but having been born looking like this.

“I’m sorry,” she says. She must have caught his expression. “I didn’t mean to be weird.” 

“It’s okay,” he says, but really _it’s not_. 

What world is it that people comment on others’ physical appearance so readily? It’s not as if she’d go up to an ‘ugly’ person and tell them, “Wow, you’re so much more hideous than your Facebook pictures show!”

Maybe people would say it’s okay because it’s a compliment, and that it’s flattering to hear things like that. But what gives them the right? What gives them the fucking right? He hasn’t done anything. People who are born ‘ugly’ haven’t done anything either. Or people born a different color or disabled or what the fuck ever. 

And yet it’s the physical attractiveness that’s okay to talk about, because it’s all about _sex_. 

At that moment his phone rings, and he’s never been so grateful to have technology interrupt a conversation. 

He pulls his phone out-- it’s Tim.

“Excuse me,” he says, “I have to take this.” 

He walks out of the store and answers.

“I have a dilemma,” Tim says, first thing. “Odette texted me.” 

“You guys have _been_ texting,” Dick says. “Like, you’ve known each other for how long?”

“Since August, but that’s beside the point. This time she used a winky emoji and I’m not sure if it’s creepy to send one back.” 

Despite himself, Dick laughs a little, just quietly enough that Tim won’t hear it. He starts walking back to his car. Fuck the Reptile Resort. He can deal with that later. 

“Timbo, I’m 25, which I’m pretty sure disqualifies me from interpreting these things.” 

“Shut up,” Tim says. “You act like you’re Alfred’s age.” 

Sometimes, Dick feels like it.

“Anyway, she sent me ‘I have my prom dress picked out’, and I said, ‘That’s great! I’ve heard they’re really hard to shop for’, and she said, ‘Yeah, my mom was going Promzilla on my behalf’, and I said, ‘Isn’t she a fashion designer?’, and she said ‘That’s my dad’--” 

“Slow down.”

“And so I said ‘Oh yeah I think I actually have a pair of his shoes’ and she said ‘Well don’t wear them to prom, that’s a faux pas if you’re taking his daughter’, and then she sent the winky face and I have read receipts on and she’s going to know that I’ve seen it and not responded and then she’s going to think I’m awkward and then--” 

“And then aliens are going to come down and mind control all of us to use as their experimental subjects while exploiting our planet for its natural resources.” 

“... What?” 

“Timmers, I know this has got to be nerve-wracking to think about, and I’m happy you feel comfortable talking about this stuff with me, but _my_ advice is not the advice you’re looking for.” 

“Fine, Obi Wan. I’ll call Barbara.”

“That might be best,” Dick says. “She’s… more knowledgeable about these things. Just breathe, Timmers, and give her a call. And if you’re still worried, we can talk about it when I get home.” 

“Okay,” Tim says. He takes a deep breath on the other end of the line. “Have a good night, Dick.” 

“You too,” Dick says, and then the conversation is over. 

He’s made his way to his car. He gets in and considers.

The conversation with Tim had distracted him enough to calm him down. And he’d gotten dressed and driven all the way to the city for-- for what? To be hit on by a teenage reptile saleswoman? 

No, this can’t be everything. He can’t let this define his night. He'll go to Jason. He lives just a couple minutes away. It’ll take longer to call than it will to _get_ there, so he’ll just head over.

Yes. If anyone will understand, it's Jason.

Without traffic it’s even quicker than he’d expected, and in what seems to be no time he finds himself ringing Jason’s doorbell. No answer.

Carlita is in her assigned parking spot, but that doesn’t mean much. He does, however, see lights on through the windows.

Jason never leaves lights on when he goes out. He calls it ‘wasteful as fuck’.

He has to be home.

Dick feels the weight of Jason’s house key, tucked safely away into his wallet. No way. That’s something he’ll only use in an emergency. He knows the importance, and the luxury, of privacy.

He rings the doorbell again. Behind him, the sun paints long lines of juxtaposing shadow and light across the city streets, and from his periphery he sees a couple of joggers go by. They have a cute dog, some kind of super hairy Husky mix and he’s glad they’re running at dusk because the dog must get hot so quickly-- 

And then Jason comes.

"I wasn't expecting you,” is all he says when the door opens. 

"Sorry, I should've called, but--"

Jason's standing a little unsteadily, one arm pressed against the doorframe. He's a large man, a very large man, and slumped as he is, unaware of his own presence, he seems to fill the doorway entirely. Coupled with the added height from the doorstep, he’s taller, so much taller, than Dick, and he’s looming over him, and--

Slade used to do that when Dick felt enough indignancy to make feeble attempts at noncompliance. He remembers once, standing in the top floor hallway of an upscale but scarcely occupied building where they’d gone to meet some of Slade’s weapons-trafficking ‘associates’. They’d just gotten out of the elevator and gone through the end-of-hall foyer, and had started heading down the hall through the open fire doors when Dick spoke up. 

“I don’t want to do this,” he’d said, more as an afterthought than anything else, because it had come to mean nothing, absolutely nothing. It had been idiotic to keep saying it; it was so _apparent_ from the beginning that it didn’t matter what he wanted. 

The grandest and most deliberate delusion, believing that he actually has or has had choices in this life…

Slade had turned around and pinned Dick against the wall with just his _presence_. No touching, and that made it even worse, because Dick shrunk back from him as surely as if he’d been burned even though he hadn't _done_ anything. What a hero he'd turned out to be, shying from looks and gestures. Disgustingly weak.

Slade had been taller than him by a foot, and his hands formed a cage so easily against the doorframe above Dick’s head, while his broad body blocked Dick’s view of anything but _him_. He'd refused to look up. He’d kept his gaze on Slade’s torso and tried not to express his terror. 

He could have gone ahead and made a scene. Screamed and cried. No one would have responded to him. People always liked to say they’d help if they saw things go _wrong,_ but statistics don't lie, and the truth is--

The truth is--

Most people are cowards. 

Dick included.

“There’s a camera right above us,” Dick had said. 

And there was, in the corner of the ceiling maybe three feet above Slade’s head, poised to keep watch down the hall. As Robin, Dick had been trained to be aware of them, and at that point, as… _whatever the hell_ he was, he’d tried to get himself seen on every camera and security system they’d passed. 

Slade had lifted his head and stared directly into the lens of the camera. His face spoke of cold death and a promise of pain.

“Do you think,” Slade had said, so very slowly, while still making eye contact with the camera, “that I care about that?” 

His casual indifference to the fact that _it_ \--whatever he might do to Dick, or even just the implication-- might have been recorded, and that someone might have eyes on that camera feed at just that moment… 

For some reason, although he’d been with Slade for a while at that point, that indifference had sent new chills down his spine. 

He’d turned around again, showing his back to Dick with such nonchalance, and Dick, pathetically, had followed him without a single glance back at the camera.

“Are you going to come in, or keep standing out there like an idiot?” 

Dick follows Jason inside, trying to ignore the afterimage of Slade’s back and the way Jason’s is so similar. The house is just as clean as it always is, but Jason’s a little disheveled. It’s not even eight in the evening, so it’s unusual for him to be this… buzzed. Jason, like Bruce, enjoys liquor, but not to excess.

There’s a bottle of gin on the counter. No shot glasses, no mixers. 

So what’s brought this about?

“Been drinking?”

“Look at you,” Jason says, “showcasing your supreme deductive capabilities.” 

Okay, he might be more than buzzed.

“I’m going to be cliché,” Dick says, “and ask you if there’s anything you want to talk about.” 

It’s really _all_ he can do. Jason is an adult, and at least he’s not drunk himself into a vomiting, sobbing stupor the way Dick had done several weeks ago. He’s in his house, alone, not causing a stir, and not… reaching out to anyone.

Jason says nothing. He grabs the bottle and Dick watches as he drinks what must be two, three shots’ worth in one go. Scientifically speaking, he has a good tolerance for alcohol, by way of being a man, and having a high percentage of musculature, and simply by being as large as he is. Dick doesn’t feel the need to intervene-- yet.

“At least drink some water,” he says. “Dehydration ruins youthful complexions.” 

It was something Selina had said to him once, after he’d gotten a terrible sunburn out on the lake while boating with her and Bruce. He’s not sure why he says it-- it’s so bluntly image-based.

And of course Jason calls him out on it.

“You’d know all about it, wouldn’t you,” he says, and Dick can’t say anything more because Jason heads off into the living room with the bottle of gin.

Dick grabs a glass of water and trails behind him. 

Jason throws himself onto the couch and supports the weight of his head with one hand, elbow propped up on the armrest. Dick sets the glass of water on the coffee table in front of him and sits down beside him. 

“I figure I owe you,” he says. “For babysitting me when I was fucked up.” 

“I’m not fucked up,” Jason says back. “I mean-- I am, but that’s permanent. Not alcohol-induced.”

“So if you’re not fucked up right now, then what are you?” 

“Drowning out the goddamn noise in my head. And no, I’m not a fuckin’ schizo. I just mean--” 

He takes a sip of the water. Dick’s happy for it.

“Do you ever sit and realize how fucked up things actually are? And then it all snowballs until there’s nothing you can do _but_ think about it, even if you try to stop?” 

“All the time,” Dick says. “Every day.” 

“Then that makes two of us.”

“... Has something happened? To make you… think of it more?”

“Life,” Jason barks. 

“Be more specific?” 

“I told you I’d handle the IDs of the kids. And I’ve gotten a few of them. Sent them off to GCPD.” 

“We don’t have to talk about that right now.”

In fact, they _shouldn’t_ talk about it right now. Jason’s… not in the best place for it, it seems. They never discuss cases over alcohol, anyway. Too much potential for error, and more emotional harm than they already feel. 

“Nah,” Jason says, “but I want to.”

And who is Dick to tell him otherwise?

“You know what it’s like to be beaten to death?”

“No,” Dick says by reflex, and then--

Oh shit. 

Oh _shit_. 

How has he been this blind? 

Just like it had been with Dami before he’d gone after Slade, he’s been so caught up in his own web of malfunction that he hasn’t _seen_ . He hasn’t seen what this case might be doing to Jason. And he’d let Jason step up, try to protect Dick from himself, take on everything. It’s a case practically _made_ to upset him-- and why hasn’t Dick noticed it before?

He’s so fucking selfish.

“Neither do I,” Jason says, with hateful humor, “but I mean... I guess if he hadn’t blown me sky high I would have died of the injuries anyway, so it’s close enough.”

“I’m sorry.” 

And, like always, it’s dreadfully inefficient. What the fuck does saying ‘sorry’ do for that? 

“It’s not your fault. You don’t gotta be sorry.” 

“Then-- I feel pain. For you.” 

“Heh,” Jason says. “Speaking of. After a while you go numb. It’s like-- your body has already felt so much, and you get used to it, so there’s no way to increase it.”

Dick thinks of Slade, and his punishments.

“I might know how that feels,” he says carefully, “but I can’t be sure, and I don’t want to assume.” 

There’s silence. Dick wonders if maybe he should divert this conversation. It’s not going anywhere pleasant. If Jason still wants to talk about it in the morning--

No.

Jason _won’t_ talk about it in the morning, because he wants to protect Dick from these things. He thinks Dick's suffered enough, and that he needs a guiding hand through the rubble and destruction of this case. 

“Dick,” Jason says, “you’re _lucky_.” 

“I’m lucky,” Dick repeats.

He tries not to take offense-- he's been thinking the same recently, after all. Ignore his time spent with Slade, and all its residual fuckery, and yeah, he’s been lucky. Phenomenally lucky, in so many ways. Lucky to have such wonderful parents. Lucky to be rescued by Bruce. Lucky to have grown up as privileged as he had. Lucky to have a good education and a family that loves him. Even, as most people say, ‘lucky’ to be as attractive as he is. 

“I mean-- shit, what happened with your parents, and Slade. That wasn’t luck. But in other terms. I think _I_ wasn’t ever meant to live. That kind of unlucky.”

“Jason,” he says. 

“Don’t look at me like that. I’m not suicidal.” 

“... Can you explain it to me, then?” 

Jason takes another sip of the gin. A small one, this time, but he knocks it back with easy practice. 

“So the foster parent. Of one of the girls. The last one she had, before she ended up on the streets. He was mine, for a little bit. Before I went on my own, too.” 

“Oh my god.” 

“And I have no idea how he _kept_ getting kids but I guess it’s my fault. You know. Because I never said anything. I just left.” 

Jason had said he’d never been sexually abused, and Dick believes him about that, but there’s so many other ways to be hurt. Jason’s probably experienced all the rest of them.

It’s a dangerous question, one whose answers will undoubtedly be awful. He asks it anyway. 

“What didn’t you say anything about?” 

“He wasn’t into boys. And even if he was, I wasn’t the right age range. He liked teenagers.” 

It’s like ice cubes are being dropped down the back of his shirt. He knows something awful’s coming, and yet--

It’s his duty to hear this. If he can’t do anything else, he can at least bear witness.

“He’d get them high as fuck. The two of them. Until they passed out. And he’d fuck them, right in front of me. His foster daughters. I tried to stop him. Once.” 

The end of that sentence tells Dick all he needs to know.

“And I didn’t know this other girl, the dead one-- she came along after me. But like I said. I coulda been one of them. I shoulda been one of ‘em.”

Leslie and Barbara. He needs to converse like they do. His own responses of outrage-- those are too close, too intense. Jason needs room to speak, because it’s his story, not Dick’s, and he’s not asking for advice. He’s not Dami, either, pleading to be loved. 

He’s Jason Todd. And that’s always been enough, even if he doesn’t realize it.

“... How often do you think about this?” 

“Every damn day,” Jason says. “How can I not? Take the tiniest little twist and some regular fuckin psycho kills me as a kid, instead of-- you know, a _supervillain_ fuckin psycho.” 

“Tell me how to help.” 

Jason looks at him and says, so dully, “There’s no _help_ for something like this. It’s all been fate catching up with me.” 

When Dick says it about himself, it’s okay, because he’s irrevocably and irretrievably fucked in the head.

But to hear Jason say it? 

“No,” he says. "That's not true.” 

It’s astonishing, the hurt in this family-- it just spirals and spirals until it’s knocked everyone off their feet. A vicious hurricane of pain and self-loathing and distorted thoughts. 

How can life be this _ugly_?

It’s fine if it’s him. He’s always kept it together. At least until now. 

And Jason, so stoic and seemingly impervious to any emotional harm--

Jason’s sitting next to him on the couch, recounting the horrible things that have happened to him as if it’s his own failing. 

As if he was always meant to die.

As if no one had ever cared to begin with.

“When I die again-- I wonder who it’ll be this time. Hopefully not the fucking Joker. That would just be adding insult to injury.” 

This darkness, this sickness. It’s enveloping them all. Eating holes into them until there’s nothing left. Has it always been there?

How has he never _known_? 

“I remember even as a kid. A little kid. I knew that my story wasn’t gonna end happily. It doesn’t, for people like me.” 

He’s been living bundled up and protected from the pain of realization due to his own issues, and maybe it’s been that way for everyone-- so concentrated on hiding their own wounds, stopping their own bleeding, that there’s nothing left to spare. 

People can’t always stitch themselves back up. 

“And someone had the fucking nerve to _bring me back_ to this hellhole. It would have been so much kinder to just leave me dead.”

“... I can’t disagree with that,” Dick says, because he _can’t_ , and he owes Jason the truth. 

Jason holds out the gin, and Dick takes it. The taste of pine needles and rubbing alcohol washes his mouth, and it’s something other than the nausea he’s gotten accustomed to.

“I figured you’d know,” Jason says. “Fuck Slade.” 

“Fuck the Joker.” 

So crude. People would say that they’re inarticulate in their hatred. That they need to express it better. That, for such awful crimes, saying ‘fuck you' to their perpetrators was nothing at all.

But right now it’s all they have.

And fuck those people, too, the ones who’d look down on them, and tell them how they’re supposed to act and think and feel, when they’ve not known a single goddamn drop of real misery. Those who say that suicide’s never the answer while they sit in a place of comfort and civility, a perch they’ve always been blessed with. 

Those who have never been cornered between those two darknesses, like he’d been.

Like Jason had been. 

So easy to fucking criticize. So easy to condemn. So easy to say, “Forgive yourself.” 

Fuck everyone.

Atop that building. Only four stories yet so high. Knowing his complicity, the evil of it, how he was changing day by fucking day. How it was only a matter of time until--

Until he ended, and someone else began. 

And so he jumped. Even now he doesn’t know what he'd meant by it. There'd been no difference between escape and death-- never had, at least for long enough. 

If he’d hit the pavement warmed by the summer sun would his body have made the same sound that his parents’ bodies had?

He's not sure. 

He probably wouldn’t have heard it. 

And.

Twisting that steering wheel with viciousness, not caring. Feeling the glass cut into him and knowing its attack was also a retreat. An escape. 

Then.

Lying on that bank, under that bridge on Sykes, the warmth leaving his body with each pump of his feeble heart, and thinking--

 _I don’t want another go at this_. 

It’s over and done.

He understands what Jason means. The thought that stories continue when they really should be kept neatly curtailed, left as a heartbreaking but poignant lesson. Something that shows examiners the cruel starkness of what happens outside of the gentle confines of normal life.

What is there, beside that grand and glorious finale? 

If he’d lay on that bank, and just kept lying there-- in the infinity of that moment, his own dwindling life--

If Bruce hadn’t come--

He wouldn’t have regretted it.

Waking up in the Cave was the interruption of a beautiful end. Living is always more painful.

A lengthy causeway of grass, lined with shards of of glass, crawling dreadfully along it. Either side reveals the abyss, the final terminal, but instead they drag themselves along, clinging to the tired earth, barely feeling the wounds as they’re inflicted, and when their bodies stop working, they look down to see white bone and cartilage and tendon exposed and set loose into the messy world. Scavengers descend to feed upon the pieces they've left behind.

That’s all their lives are. 

It’s just a matter of how long they can continue before they die of the blood loss, and the pain, and the _hurt_. 

There’s no end to it. Life keeps coming, and the agony goes around, a disgusting commodity without worth, spread like a plague. 

This family needs help.

It needs--

A lot of help.

And no one will ever admit it. 

He’s not sure that there’s such a thing as ‘help’ for people as damaged as they are, and if there is, how would they know it when they saw it? And, if they continue to live these lives of dysfunction, then what’s the fucking point of help in the first place?

Fixing windows only to shatter them.

Building bridges only to burn them. 

Making heroes only to break them.

What’s the goal? When does their crusade end? Are they going to be like Bruce, forty years old and still sacrificing themselves for the world?

They probably won’t even reach the age of forty, either of them.

And who the fuck chose this for them, anyway? 

Why do they do this?

Who in their _right minds_ would do this?

Who in their right minds would choose to _live_ , after this?

The end to which they’re striving.

It doesn’t fucking exist.

There’s no promised land. No point of everlasting peace.

It’s pain, and struggle, and death.

Dick takes the bottle again. 

At least in this moment, here with his brother, he can feel nothing at all. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As always, let me know of any typos or errors, and I love hearing what you have to say.


	4. Unrefined

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Dick has a couple of difficult conversations. The pets get more toys. Dick's anger at Bruce escalates. Tim's prom night comes.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Reminder: Dick is a very unreliable narrator, and we don't know other characters' states of mind. We only know what Dick thinks about them.

“I waited for you to come back last night,” Tim tells him Wednesday around noon, when Dick’s dragged himself back from Gotham to the Manor. “You… stayed out?” 

“Jason’s,” Dick clarifies, but it’s unnecessary; they all have trackers in their phones and vehicles, although Jason himself refuses to participate in the program unless he’s out on a mission. Still, he _should_ have been responsible enough to shoot a text to Bruce, Dami, and Tim last night, but by the time it was apparent he’d be staying over, he’d also been far too gone to text. 

Tim gives him a look that not so much suggests but outright states that he knows what they got up to. It’s infuriating because Dick has showered and hydrated and done his best to neither look nor act like he got absolutely hammered the night before. 

They’re in the kitchen. Tim’s home because it’s an internship day for him, and Dick’s home because… where the hell else would he be? 

(Aside from Jason’s, that is.) 

He’s staring at the coffee maker. It’s state of the art, but for some reason it seems like it’s running so… damn… slowly. He’d had espresso before leaving Jason’s, but he needs something more if he’s going to survive this talk. 

“It was because of the case,” he says, trying to salvage at least a little bit of dignity. “We got to talking about it, and…” 

“Right,” Tim says. “Makes sense. So you stayed over. Next time you should probably tell Damian in advance though.” 

“Huh?”

“He was looking for you before he went to bed. I told him you were at Jason’s and would be back later.”

“Ah shit,” Dick says, remembering suddenly. “And I said I’d go over things with Odette with you when I got home, and--”

“Don’t worry about it. Babs gave me a good pep talk.”

That doesn’t assuage Dick’s guilt about flaking out on a promise, but he’s grateful he didn’t have to force himself to give suitable advice about-- _t_ _hat_ \-- again. And, inevitably, his thoughts turn back to Damian.

“Do you know what he wanted?” 

“I think he just wanted to talk to you,” Tim says. “But-- can I tell you something? Something you may not like?”

“What is it?”

“First. Uh. If you feel uncomfortable, tell me and I’ll stop. I promise.” 

Tim’s asking for permission this time, instead of throwing facts and deductions at him the way he’d done when the truth had… come out. It feels good. Asking if someone’s okay with something-- consent even in such simple things--

Yeah, it’s nice.

“Alright,” Dick says.

And then, as if his social niceties have been exhausted, Tim's words come without cushion or hedging. “Damian’s worried about you.” 

In the Batfamily, there are several tiers of worry. 

First there’s their customary, almost jovial worry. For example: _Tim’s been up for three nights straight and I’m worried his head is gonna explode if he doesn’t go to bed. Help me wrangle him from the computer?_

Then there’s the routine yet genuine worry, like when someone’s injured on patrol, bad enough to knock them down. Not immediately life-threatening, but definitely something to attend to before anything else. 

And then there’s the short-lived, piercing, unsolvable worry that occurs in crisis-- something that can’t be maintained for long because it’s just _that_ unbearable. The moment he’d found out Damian had been with Slade, for instance. He’d become catatonic with the shock of it, and what follows... 

What follows is an inexorable, inescapable worry. It gnaws at their stomachs and corrodes every moment of potential happiness due to its presence. But it’s worry of-- of what? Dick felt it when he’d been with Slade, every damn moment of every damn day, the knowledge that his future was limited and so severely affected. It had reappeared when Bruce had gone missing, and doubled itself when Damian had gotten captured. 

At its root, is it fear of losing someone? The knowledge that they’d already been lost?

Who knows. 

Maybe they’re experiencing that worry by watching Dick… do what they say he’s doing to himself. In fact, they’ve said as much. He’s just not been in a position to receive it. And he doesn’t think he is now, either. 

“How do you know?” Dick asks blankly, as if it’s not blatantly effing obvious to everyone, especially to the adults in the family. Alfred and Bruce can tell if he’s a millisecond off beat. Leslie and Gordon somehow have the same ability. Since they’ve gotten closer, even Jason has become uncannily good at it. 

But Tim and Dami-- they’re kids. And sure, Tim’s turning 18 in July, and Damian 13 shortly after that, but still-- 

He’d like to believe that he’s shielded them from these things, inasmuch as he can. Damian knows only by merit of eavesdropping; in fact, that’s how _everyone_ knows. His littlest brother-- his _son_ \-- doesn’t know all the facts. No one knows all the facts, and Dami knows the least out of them all. He wants to keep it that way. 

“He’s a smart kid. I know he and I haven’t always gotten along, but things are different now, and-- he’s been talking more to me.” 

“Why did he come to you?” 

“I think,” Tim says, “because I’m the one in this family with the least issues. He doesn’t want to burden anyone else.” 

“God,” Dick sighs, and isn’t that the life for all of them? Ignoring problems because they don’t want to hurt others, or see their reactions, or reveal their own damage. Hoping that, if they don’t mention it or address it, it’ll just… _go away_. 

Look at how well that’s worked for them over the years. 

“He said you told him about… Mirage and Tarantula.” 

“No,” Tim says. “He asked me who the others you mentioned were, and I said I didn’t know. Then he asked me if women could rape men, and I said ‘yes’, and probably… he figured it from my tone, or my expression, and went from there. I don't think he knows names.” 

“Damn Talia. He shouldn’t even be thinking of questions like that in the first place.” 

As much as he hates her, and as much as he wished what had happened to Bruce _hadn’t_ happened… he doesn’t know how to feel. He wouldn’t have Damian if it weren’t for her vile actions. And how sick is that, that he’s leveraging his own happiness against the crime that happened to Bruce? By putting Damian above anything and everything else in his life, is he saying that he’s okay with what happened?

That’s a ridiculous thought. Damian has nothing to do with it. It’s never been his fault and never will be. But in times like these, when everything seems to be undergoing new scrutiny, he can’t be sure what’s right and what’s wrong any more. Maybe it’s because he’s warped and twisted and disgusting, or maybe it’s because the world is, or maybe it’s both of them.

He’s never known the difference.

“Just,” Tim says, “just… we see you hurting, and we want to help, but we don’t know how.” 

_We_.

That’s right. He’s not in a vacuum. His actions do have effects on others, as much as he’d like to keep it all hidden away. 

He presses his lips together, long enough for the swell of indignation to fall back down in his chest. Looking at it objectively-- yeah, if one of them were acting this way, it would be of concern. But they’re not _him_.

“I’ve never been abused,“ Tim says. “Maybe my parents weren’t very attentive, but-- I don’t know anything about what it must have been like for you or Dami or Jason to grow up the way you did.” 

“They neglected you, that’s still--” 

“I had everything I could ever want,” Tim says, “from the time that I was born. That’s not chargeable neglect. And besides-- I didn’t even like them, or respect them. I didn’t want attention from them.”

“Just because they weren’t _horrible_ doesn’t mean they didn’t affect you.”

“I feel like you’re deflecting,” Tim says, and dammit, maybe that’s true. But focusing on Dick-- it’s uncomfortable. Everyone already knows that he’s fucked up, and he doesn’t need any more of this coddling bullshit, and--

“I don’t understand,” Dick says. “Not being mean but-- I don’t understand why we’re having this conversation.” 

“Because,” Tim says, “I think I’m the only one with an ‘outside’ perspective.” 

“Perspective on what?” 

He’s playing dumb. He’s always played dumb with things like this. But, just like Jason knows him too well, Tim is too smart to fall for it. 

“This family. And-- stop me if you need-- but… this family, our family, isn’t _normal_. It isn’t _healthy_. The dynamics in general aren’t, and it becomes more complicated when you bring in people who’ve experienced severe trauma--”

“--Like Bruce and Dami and Jason,” Dick interjects.

“ _And like you_ ,” Tim says. “With all these interposing factors, it turns into a difficult situation. Can you agree with that?”

Logically speaking, yes. That makes sense. He’d been thinking of it himself, last night, mind soaked in gin and Jason’s reminisced cruelties.

“Yeah,” he says. “I guess.” 

Tim’s expression doesn’t change, but Dick senses his satisfaction. 

“People notice things. Even when you think you’re hiding them.”

As if he _could_ hide anything from this family of detectives, especially Bruce and Tim. His best bet has always laid in hoping that they’ll be too hesitant to confront him about it. Looks like that’s falling apart.

“I’m not going to shoot you a list of things you should or shouldn’t be doing. I’m sure you already know them.”

Tim’s right. He does know what’s ‘correct’ behavior. Eating more often, for one. That’s probably the most noticeable. They usually have mealtimes together, and it’s glaringly apparent when Dick’s plate is barren, or, as is becoming more often, when he’s not present at all. And-- it’s not like he hasn’t already been nagged multiple times over his weight loss. What is it now, twenty pounds? Twenty-five? What a trivial number. Why do they _care_? Is it because of Nightwing, because he’s useless?

He knows that’s not it, but that’s what comes up first. That he’s useless. That he needs to get his shit together so he can be of service again. 

How can he explain himself when it’s this hard to formulate inside his head? The reasons he wants to give for his behavior fade away as if they’re smoke being dispersed by the wind. 

“But anyway. I’m saying this because it’s true, I _don’t know_ what it’s like for you. I’m sure I couldn’t imagine--”

He resists the urge to scoff. _Couldn’t imagine_. As if he went through a trial of hell’s ordeals instead of what really happened: some rape and a short stint of captivity. He’d been prepared; in fact, he’d been Bruce’s soldier. He’d known what he’d gotten himself into. 

(His bones hadn't even fused.)

“--and I know it’s got to feel impossible to think about, much less deal with, but you’re my brother--”

Dick wants to retract from that statement, to say that there’s no way he can be considered worthy of it, how when he’s lost the war against himself he’s no longer able to claim membership to such a worthy role as _Older Brother_ \--

But Tim will just fight against it.

And what’s the point of fighting anymore, anyway?

“-- and I want, we all want you to be happy and healthy.”

Reverse the positions and he’d want Tim to quit this, to get help. What the fuck kind of help is there for _him_? He’s not sure, but he knows that if this were Tim, or anyone else, he’d find it. He wouldn’t rest until he got it for them.

But-- and he’s got to remember this, to keep himself steady-- Tim’s not him. Damian’s not him. They’re real, actual people, and for them, such consideration and comfort goes without question. When someone’s real they get to have those sorts of things. They’re allowed to give preferences and say what they like and dislike. 

What they want and don’t want.

What they will and won’t do. 

If those are the standards, then Dick hasn’t been real since he was fourteen years old.

And oh, how Slade had taught him the lessons of falsity. How to smile when he hated it, how to pretend that it didn't _hurt_ , how to focus on that tiny bit of himself that served as a reservoir, a retreat, and to imagine that it was all a figment of fiction inside the mind of a uniquely sick creator. That the indignity and hatred was really-- just normal-- and that no one should or could or would seek to correct such things, because it was exactly what he deserved, anyway.

Looks like that. A smile like that. Flexibility like that.

Whatever the fuck.

He feels it all and it’s like dying again. He doesn’t understand how, sometimes, it can be so tolerable, dark waters in the cellar of his mind that are ignorable unless he chooses to wade through them. These days it seems like the water keeps rising until it finds him even when he’s at rest. The cold and filth inches up his body as he tries in vain to navigate through without getting wet.

(Those bodies in the side rooms of the basement. Their skeletons, so juvenile, not fully formed...)

All of it-- present and defining, as if it’s something that he’d chosen. As if it’s something that he’d wanted.

And what is he supposed to say?

He’d chosen not to fight. He _did_ want it. Yeah, he wanted it; it was easier than the violence, and no matter what it’d have ended up the same. His resistance only ever resulted in more pain. Why add that? So much easier to _let_ Slade take him. To _let_ him do all those fucking disgusting things. Struggling was nothing more than an insult added to the injury of being so abused. 

So really--

So really--

That flurry of thoughts took only a few seconds, but Tim, ever perceptive, has noticed the minute changes on Dick’s face. 

“Come on,” he says, usual stridence gone from his tone. “You’re right here.”

“I know where I am,” Dick snaps. “I’m not crazy.”

Tim shrugs. “Memories can be a hell of a place.”

There are a lot of replies Dick can make to that. Some are genuinely mean, some half-hearted, some even vaguely appreciative. 

He settles for muttering, “The whole world is,” and hopes that’s enough. 

* * *

Dick’s curled on the couch, the matching journal to Damian’s resting on his crossed legs. Most of the pages are still blank. He’s annoyed with himself for not getting an earlier start on it; Damian had been so enthused to see it, and is almost assuredly waiting for Dick to declare his own journal done so that they can trade off. 

The questions are supposed to be easy. That’s why he got it, so why is he having such difficulties? He’s been looking at the same page for the past half hour. It states, _If you could go back in time ten years, what would you tell yourself?_

On the surface, it seems easy to respond to. _I’d tell myself to invest in Apple stock_ , someone might say, or, _Marry your high school sweetheart sooner_ , or even, on the darker end of things, _Don’t get involved with drugs; you’ll regret it_. 

He wants to write something positive, something Damian can read and feel like he’s gotten to know him better, but that won’t drag them down into the mire of ubiquitous dysfunction surrounding the family. The problem is… ten years ago was a heinously miserable time in his life, and if he omits that by way of some bland answer, isn’t that the same as lying to the child who, in all but biology, is his son?

The indecision leads to endless variances of the same beginning sentence, erased again and again. He’s glad he’s written it in pencil; at this point, he’d have ruined half the page trying to get something down in pen. 

He hasn’t been productive recently. Not with the case, not with family matters, not with training. Not with anything at all. His own misery and patheticness inhibits him from leading the sort of carefree life the media itself says he lives. 

It had taken him a while to even decide that _this_ was the prompt that he wanted to answer. The others had seemed too overwhelming. One had been, _Describe your family, and each member in it._

Ha. What a loaded question. So many directions from which to aim the light, and observe the subject. 

From the exterior--

Bruce Wayne is a congenial fop. He doesn’t have the scandals that other socialites and business elites often get caught up in, and maybe it’s weird that he’s never married up with an heiress but-- he dates, and besides, doesn’t his bachelor lifestyle seem so _glamorous_? He’s got a heart, too; he funds so many charities and has adopted how many orphans, now? 

Speaking of orphans-- the first one of the bunch is Richard Grayson, the adorable circus kid who grew up to be an incredibly handsome young man. He’s a little shy about the media, but what could you expect from _his_ background? He grew up and tried to go be a police officer; who would want to do _that_ when they could have his life of luxury? It makes sense that he’d quit and gone back to live with his family. Snap a photo and look at his beautiful body; post it to the internet and read all the comments about how fuckable he is. 

Jason Todd was Bruce’s tragic adoptee, straight from a disadvantaged life in inner-city Gotham. Drug addict mother, criminal father. So kind of Bruce to take in such a-- _project_. He died in a car crash at the tender age of 15. What a pitiful soul. A rough start in life and an even rougher end.

Then, Timothy Drake. From a better family than Jason, and so much more civilized. An intelligent young man whose continuous involvement in Wayne Enterprises, even at his young age, promises a bright future for him. He’s quiet in front of the cameras too, even more so than his older brother Richard, but at galas and other functions he’s dignified and correct. A product of Gotham’s upper classes.

And finally, Damian Wayne, Bruce’s mysteriously hidden biological son. He’d stayed with his mother until the age of 10, and then life circumstances brought him to live with his father. His mother’s identity is still a secret, but gossip abounds. Was she European nobility, or maybe a socialite darling? Perhaps it had been a scandalous affair, hidden from her family and the media. But regardless, Damian’s been with his father for almost 3 years now, and he’s so adorable. He doesn’t show up in the press much, just as Richard had been shielded, but his presence brings new questions and possibilities for the Wayne dynasty. 

Yes. That’s what outsiders see. An extremely privileged yet patchwork family. Maybe they had some unfortunate events in their lives, all those dead parents and whatnot, but really--

They lived their lives so comfortably. That enormous Manor and the huge estate that accompanied it, in the beautiful wooded terrain outside of Gotham. The yachts and private planes and grand international vacations. Richard in particular had been gone for _six months_ on a fabulous world tour, for the summer and fall after he turned 14. Lifestyles of luxury that the hoi polloi could scarcely imagine. Never worrying for anything. Employees at beck and call. All sorts of expensive hobbies and adventures, the things normal people could never hope to experience. 

That’s their façade. 

It’s so fucking invalidating, and it’s not as if anyone in the family would ever want their issues made public, but still. 

People look at him and see someone who’s had it easy their whole life. Even his fellow heroes, the ones who know his true identity-- there’s always a bit of awe. Bruce Wayne’s first kid. Wow, what was it like growing up so rich?

He knows he’s privileged. He knows it. The Wayne family has been privileged for centuries. But at the same time-- that privilege led to Bruce becoming Batman. Unlike people with powers, there’s no way he could have become a superhero without all his technology and money. And his presence in the Justice League has enabled funding of people who otherwise would be out on equipment, or gear, or travel. He’s the reason the League is as financially stable as it is.

And Bruce being Batman… made Dick into Robin. 

Without that--

There would never have been Slade, or Mirage, or Tarantula, and certainly not the life he’s led following those events. It would be just like the papers said: a life in which his biggest problem was deciding what incredibly expensive outfit to wear, or what rumors the tabloids had spread about him _this_ time. 

Becoming Robin had… twisted his life into something else. Something that others might call exciting and extraordinary, but which in reality exposed him to every. fucking. thing. that’s harmed him. 

He doesn’t know how to feel about it.

It’s been his whole life. He can barely remember a time before saving people and sacrificing himself became the norm.

Would his parents have wanted this? What would they say now, if they could see him? Would they curse him for living this way, squandering the potential for happiness they’d given him? Would they blame Bruce instead? He can’t imagine they’d be happy to know all that’s gone on in his life. 

They’ve been in the ground for nearly twenty years and likely wouldn’t recognize him now. In every way, in every way that matters, Bruce has been his father, and Bruce loves him so much that--

It makes no fucking sense.

Why had Bruce let him be Robin? Why the hell would he have introduced _children_ to this lifestyle? Children can’t consent to marriage, or sex, or even something as mundane as taking out a loan. But somehow Dick was capable of deciding that he wanted to fight psychopaths when he’d been _nine_? 

God.

The feeble insistence that Bruce wouldn’t have been able to stop him anyway, that he’d just been dedicated to that life from the start-- that’s bullshit. It is. Sure, Dick had been fascinated when he’d found out that Bruce was Batman; what child wouldn’t have been? Still, Bruce had been the parent. 

It was his responsibility to keep him _safe_.

Dick hadn’t wanted to go to school, either, yet Bruce had put his foot down and insisted, and so off Dick had gone to Gotham Academy. So, in light of that, why would he let that same child choose the course of their life in such a monumental way?

Thinking of Bruce in this way makes him feel like an ungrateful wretch. And, really, hasn’t he perpetuated the same thing that he’s criticizing Bruce for?

He let Damian become Robin. Encouraged him, actually-- kicked Tim out of the nest and brought a new bird in. But that’s-- he has to tell himself that that’s different. Damian had been raised that way. No choice in the matter. Even if he tried to restrict him from the lifestyle, it wouldn’t have worked. Being Robin was what led Damian to stay in the first place. Not the best solution, not by a long shot, but it was what had worked.

Is it really different, or is he making excuses for himself?

Damian had come within a hair’s breadth of the same sort of soul-killing trauma that’s ruined Dick forever. And if that had happened-- if Slade had done those things to him-- it would have been all Dick’s fault.

He looks back down at the notebook again. The same question stares up at him, just like it has for the past hour now. 

_If you could go back in time ten years, what would you tell yourself?_

He begins to write. 

The pencil’s sharpened point has become dulled, so his handwriting is more blurred and messy than it otherwise would be. He hopes Dami can still read it. 

Honesty. He can’t expect it if he doesn’t give it, and more than that-- Damian deserves to know. 

> _Ten years ago, I was in a very dark place. A lot of bad things had happened to me, and I’d survived somehow, but I hadn’t ever planned on it. I’d accepted that I was going to die, and when I didn’t, it was a shock. I never thought I was suicidal, but the whole point of living seemed to have gone away. It was like there’d never be any happiness in my life again, no matter how much the people around me wanted me to believe differently._
> 
> _If I could go back to talk to myself at that age, I’d tell myself that life wasn’t over, because people would come along that I’d not only be willing to die for-- I’d be willing to live for them, too. One of them is Damian, my son._

* * *

Jason comes over to the Manor this time for the case, partly because Alfred has made burgers for lunch and they’re Jason’s favorite of all time. He’d mentioned it casually via text-- _Btw, burgers are on the grill_ , and less than a minute later, Jason had replied, _Omw motherfuckaaa_. 

(Dick doesn’t tell him that Alfred made them on purpose in an attempt to lure him over.) 

They sit out on the screened-in porch that overlooks the side yard. It’s a revoltingly beautiful mid-May day, enough so to make him feel guilty for ‘wasting’ it by not doing something outside. He can’t muster up the energy, though; being on the porch is almost too much by itself, when he hears the birds sing and is reminded of how he’d been in a cage of his own.

He looks at the food on Jason’s plate in order to distract himself. The burger, which Jason has already halfway devoured, looks like something out of a chef magazine. Sweet potato fries accompany it.

Dick reaches out to grab one, just one, and nibbles on half of it. Jason doesn’t react at all, which is maybe why he feels okay doing it. It’s too greasy, and he doesn’t go for another, but the salt on his tongue is something his body’s been craving. Probably something or other about not getting enough minerals due to his current eating habits, or lack thereof. 

He sips on some sparkling water --his only addition to the table-- to get the taste of the grease out of his mouth, and waits for Jason to get done. It doesn’t take long, and soon Alfred has come to collect the plates. Then they get back to work on the case. 

“So they found something interesting,” Jason says, opening up his laptop. “Gordon got me some more info from the coroner’s office.” 

“Oh yeah?” It strikes Dick dully that, since Jason had insisted on doing the IDs, he’s really not done much for the case. How much of that is his own laziness and how much of it is Jason's continued protection, he has no idea.

“Yeah,” Jason says. He turns his laptop around and shows an image of upper and lower human jaws whose teeth are numbered neatly. “Left maxillary canine absent from the bite wounds on one of the kids. All the rest of them have it.”

“So that might be the last one he’s done.”

“Exactly.”

Dick hopes one of the victims caused him to lose his tooth. A moment of defiance, brave to the end--

They wouldn’t be like him, after all. 

“We can’t depend on that to find him,” Dick says, to divert himself. “He could get a dental implant.” 

“Or maybe he’s too fuckin’ broke or crazy or whatever to do that because he’s spending all his time murdering.” 

Dick gives him a glance.

“What? Teeth are expensive to fix and I kinda doubt this guy has a stable relationship with a dentist.”

Again, Jason’s a tether to the real world. All their teeth are perfect-- bright white smiles that received the best dental care available. He remembers an ancient, snaggle-toothed palm reader from the circus. She had been born in Eastern Europe during World War Two, and her teeth had never grown in right due to wartime nutritional deficits. When Haly’s rolled through the more affluent cities on their route, she’d scoff at some of the kids who came in, kids with metallic grins from their braces, and say that only the privileged could afford such things. 

And it was true. In the depths of desperation, no one cares about straight teeth or veneers or cosmetic whitening. 

God, no wonder he’s making no headway on this case.

He’s so out of fucking touch. 

“Might be helpful,” he agrees, from lack of anything else to say. 

“ _And_ ,” Jason says, sounding strangely excited, “guess what?”

The same kind of phrasing as he’d used with Damian and the gifts he’d gotten for him and the pets. He can’t find it within himself to make three guesses, especially under such morbid circumstances, so he stays silent and lets Jason decide when to continue. 

“We got a bunch of tissue to send off for DNA testing.”

“That’s great news."

“Yeah, some skin cells under the fingernails of one of the boys. It’s at the lab right now, and who knows, maybe it’s from someone else, but it could also be from the perpetrator.”

“That’s a really solid lead,” Dick says, and despite the morosity of the situation he can’t help but smile just a little. Jason’s such a good detective, so motivated and intense, with a dedication that’s raw and emotional, not like the clinical detachment Bruce and Tim use.

Jason _cares_. 

And it’s not like the others don’t. They do care, in their way, but Jason cares like Dick does. Like it-- like it’s personal.

Which, he guesses, it is. For both of them. 

“We’re makin’ progress,” Jason affirms. “They’re still staking out the old factory. We’ll get the dumb fuck at some point or another.” 

Dick tilts his head to stare at the decorative ceiling fan above them. Its blades are stylistically shaped to look like long, ovate leaves.

“To tell the truth, I kind of wish Gordon had never saddled us with this case. Does that make me an asshole?” 

“No, it makes you someone who wishes the police did their damn job.” 

“Normally I don’t mind picking up the slack. I mean, that’s what we’re here for. But this--”

“Is a little too close to home. I get ya. I really do.” 

Yeah, their night of shared misery had been more than enough to confirm that. 

“So,” Jason continues, “in the interest of transparency and all that bullshit, I gotta tell ya something.” 

What is Dick, a priest? Everyone’s been coming out of the woodwork with this or that to tell him. He should open up his own confessional box. 

“Go for it,” he says. 

“Don’t freak out,” he says. “It’s not really a big deal to me. But I feel like you should know.”

“I’m listening.” 

“So… you kissed me.” 

That sentence, coming from Jason to him, makes absolutely zero sense. He runs over it a couple of times-- maybe he’d misheard. Maybe it was ‘ _you missed me’_?

“I did what?”

Jason sighs and runs a hand through his hair, then puts his hands flat on the patio table again. He’s leaning forward slightly. It’s earnest body language, something that he must be orchestrating to make Dick feel better.

“You kissed me. The night I took you out in Carlita. When you got hella drunk.”

That night. That absolutely miserable night, the one that had almost certainly inspired Damian to leave in the first place. Upon seeing his father figure so torn up and tied down by misery, he’d thought that he could fix it, when it had never been under his purview to begin with. 

Jason’s right-- Dick had gotten so drunk he barely remembers it. What he’s able to recall is ignominious and humiliating. Vomiting into the grass. Crying that he should be left on the road. Jason’s incensed replies about how stupid it was to say such things. 

But he certainly, _certainly_ doesn’t remember anything about kissing. Especially not with Jason, who’s his brother. Holy shit. How could he have possibly fucked up this badly?

“... Are you joking?” 

“No,” Jason says. “I wouldn’t mess with you on a topic like this.”

He closes his eyes and wishes that his body would disintegrate, fall like grains of sand onto the floor, and be swept away.

“What’s the… context of me doing that?”

“We were looking at the stars, and you started crying.”

Typical. His weak fucking self.

“You asked me if you were ‘pretty’ and I didn’t say anything. Then you said you’d prove it to me. And then… yeah.”

As if his issues hadn’t already affected this family enough. The shame of all this, how he’s acted-- it’s unbearable. 

“I’m so sorry,” he says, and, like always, when is saying ‘sorry’ ever enough for anything? Basically what he’s hearing is that he’d _assaulted_ his own brother. Forced a kiss on him while in the dying throes of his own despair. 

Totally fucking unacceptable.

"I don’t think you knew it was me, not really. I think you were… remembering some things.” 

“That doesn’t make it any better,” Dick says, and he’s washed by his revulsion at himself. “I fucking-- I _forced you_ \--”

“Dick,” Jason says, his voice is heavy with intent, “do you really think that you, in that state, could have _forced_ me to do anything?” 

Dick’s not even drunk, and right now he couldn’t force Jason to do anything either. Not that he would, but his weight loss makes him feel so weak. There’s never been this power differential between him and Jason. He's always had the advantage of more years of training, more experience in the field, and even so, right now-- 

Jason could make him do… whatever he wanted.

And he’s being disgusting again. His own _brother_. Jason would never hurt him. But the fact remains that, in the past, Jason had. He’d had every reason to-- he’d been overcome with madness through the horror of his own resurrection. And it hadn’t been _him_ , not really. That level of altered consciousness couldn’t be attributed to Jason. It was all the Pit. 

And they’ve been through that. They’ve apologized to each other again and again about it, in the weird oblique way that this family does everything. 

“It’s not always about forcing,” Dick says finally. “Sometimes people don’t… fight back, and that’s not their fault either. I’m _sorry_.”

“I knew it was you having some kind of flashback--” 

Dick winces. He hates that word. So superfluous. It doesn’t apply to him. But it would be rude and disrespectful to interrupt, especially after what Jason’s just told him, so he sits and takes it.

“-- and I stopped you before anything else happened. But I’ve gotta ask you --”

Oh god.

“-- because it’s my duty, as someone who cares about you--” 

He can’t deal with this.

“-- has anything _I’ve_ ever done made you think that… you owed me something like that?”

Dick starts laughing. Jason looks startled, and then affronted.

“Hey, we’re having a serious conversation. Answer the question.” 

“ _No_ ,” Dick says. “God, no. Are you asking me if I’m _afraid_ of you?” 

Jason interlocks his hands and looks down at his scarred knuckles. He’s silent for a little while, and when he speaks, it’s slow and deliberate. 

“I don’t know what I’m asking,” he says, “but sometimes it’s like you look at me, but you’re not looking at _me_.”

Dick thinks.

The way Jason treads, so heavy and confident, through the house, as if there’s no possible reason he’d need to _hide_ himself, as strong as he is. How Jason had held his chin the morning Damian disappeared, its similarity to the choking Slade had so enjoyed. His massive hands and overwhelming presence, the way he wears his obvious danger so comfortably. The ease with which he’d put Dick onto the mat, again and again, during sparring. The smoking and deadly capabilities, the lethal familiarity and familiar lethality. And even dumb fucking things like the seatbelt in Carlita-- so different from the one he’d cut through in his escape, but still-- but still--

“ _No_ ,” Dick says, and he’s lying, “you don’t-- that’s not right-- I see _you_.” 

“Really. Because-- and I didn’t realize this soon enough-- I’m pretty much Slade’s same height and build.”

“You’re an inch shorter,” Dick says, and--

 _Fuck_. 

Point proven.

“I remind you of him,” Jason says. “Not just in-- physical appearance. That’s what you meant. With the smoking.”

“No--”

“That night, and the night when you asked me not to smoke in your room and I did it anyway. At the window.”

How is it that Jason can recall such things with acuity when he forgets his… own… birthday?

He realizes it all at once, and it feels as though he’s been punched in the solar plexus. All thoughts vanish from his mind, except that one.

Birthdays.

Deathdays.

Fuck.

“That’s why you were drinking,” he says flatly, and some desperate, drowning part of himself is glad to have this as--

As what? A distraction? A way to pivot the attention away from himself and his fuckups? 

“What?” 

“When I came over to tell you about the new case.” 

“Stop trying to change the subject,” Jason says, and it’s fucking funny because here goes Dick trampling over that word. Stop. The word that’s never meant much in his own life--

“That day. You’d died on that day. That was--”

He remembers it well, because when Bruce had asked him to go with him, it had been thirty one days since he’d been burned. His birthday was March 21st, and he’d been burned-- yes, March 27th. He counts it off quickly in his head and, with unwanted horror, realizes that--

On the anniversary of Jason’s brutal death at the hands of the Joker, Dick had gone over to his house, his place of safety, and told him all about the children that had been most likely _beaten to death_. Children with the same background Jason had, the same life struggles and unfairness. 

He’s the king of fucking tact. 

Jason mutters a curse and tosses his head, throwing an irate glance to the corner of the ceiling before looking back at Dick. With concentrated effort that’s visible on his face, he tamps himself back down.

“I was making a _margarita_ because I wanted a _drink_. It wasn’t because of whatever fucking day it may or may not have been.” 

Jason’s been back for 3 years now. Last year, Dick had been aware of the date and let Jason do what he did best-- lick his wounds in private. The year before that, they hadn’t been close enough for it to matter. 

But that’s how it always is, isn’t it?

This fucking family, joined shoddily at the seams of intersecting despair and trauma and loneliness. Without that, what the hell do they even have in common? How would they have come together otherwise? 

“How drunk would you have gotten if I hadn’t showed up?”

“Dick--”

“How long have I been ignoring that you need help? More than me, I mean--”

“It’s not a fucking _competition,_ ” Jason spits out, as if it’s lit gasoline and he has to expel it before his lungs collapse, “and it doesn’t _matter_ because it’s _my business_.” 

Everyone’s reached out to Dick, tried to help him and reassure him and comfort him. Tim with his pie scheme, Bruce and those fucking circus peanuts, Damian even offering him Alfred the _cat_ while Alfred the _butler_ prepared things he’d be more likely to eat. 

And who the hell’s extending a helpful hand to Jason, like that?

Who ever has?

Take it at face value, the vulgar language and his seemingly impregnable vault of emotions. The way he flashed with anger but how he never got sad, or morose, or even caught up in his own head--

“If it’s your business then what’s going on with me is only my business, too.”

Jason’s clenching his teeth. Dick can see the masseter muscle at the corner of his jaw, flexing and loosening as he tries to formulate what to say. 

“And-- I know what you’re going to tell me,” Dick says, hoping that Jason’s control will hold long enough for him to make his point, “that it’s different for me because it’s affecting my body. But with you, it affects stuff too, it’s not--”

“It’s not an issue and we are not discussing it. End of story.” 

“You’re telling me that you’re not bothered by this? You _died_ and I come bringing you details about abused street kids--”

“Stop,” Jason says. “Fucking _stop_.”

Stop. 

Dick sees it as it is: just like a stop sign on the road. It can’t _force_ anyone to stop. It’s more of an… advisory. A warning. But people can steal the sign or knock down the post, leaving the intersection hazardous. Some people see it and choose to ignore it, driving straight through without regard for what might happen to themselves and others. Other times they’re so blinded by inclement weather that it might be impossible to see. And sometimes, no one recognizes that there _needs_ to be a sign telling people to stop, not until it’s too late and something-- irreparable-- happens.

“I’ll stop fucking you,” Slade said once, “if you stop resisting me.” 

It had baffled him. He wasn’t _resisting_. He laid still and did exactly what Slade wanted him to do. Choked on him like a hanged man. Laid under him like the pelt of some animal, killed for a trophy. Even --and this was the worst-- got on top, as if he were the summit of his own violation. What was he _but_ nonresistance, dissolved in the sea of Slade’s indomitability? 

“You know what I mean,” Slade said, and Dick didn’t -- _fucking move--_ as the man put his hand on the side of Dick’s neck, fingers probing for the throb of his heartbeat. Then he slid up, up, up, until he had hold of Dick’s hair, pulled just taut enough to hurt. 

“What you’re choosing to undergo,” he continued, “what you’re electing to suffer-- it’s all a result of what's in your mind.” 

“So is everything,” Dick had said, and the hand in his hair rose and rose until Dick came to stand on the balls of his feet. 

He’d wondered how much more weight he could lose before he came off the ground with that hand-- how much longer until the wind swept him away and took him from that place. 

Dick looks back at Jason.

“I’ll stop,” he says finally, “if you don’t mention my ‘stuff’ again.”

Jason seems like he wants to argue again, but the tension around his eyes and jaw dissipates after a moment.

“Fine,” he says. “Fine. If that’s how it-- you-- whatever needs to be, then fine.” 

It has nothing to do with him, Dick thinks, and everything to do with making it _stop_ , and maybe Jason will learn that lesson one day, too. 

Jason leaves, but not before very politely thanking Alfred for lunch and being given heaps of leftovers in return. He gives Dick a salute and then heads off to the garage.

Dick wanders into the kitchen, where Alfred’s cleaning up, and says, “I think I’ll pick Dami up from school today. You can tell his driver to cancel.” 

If Alfred’s surprised, he doesn’t show it. He just nods his understanding. Dick texts Damian with, _How about I pick you up and we get ice cream after school today?_ The kid’s in class, so his reply is quick, concise, simple: _Wonderful_. 

Dick goes to his room, finds the anti-nausea medications Leslie had prescribed. He takes two of each. He’s going to fucking eat some ice cream even if it kills him, and he’s going to keep it down, too. 

It’s worth it, for Dami. 

Everything is.

* * *

So the plan didn’t work.

Correction: part of it didn’t work.

He went to get Dami from school, whose face lit up like a lamp when he saw Dick’s car in the pickup lane of Gotham Academy. He’d gotten into the passenger seat with ill-concealed excitement, and started rambling about his new art project. Convenient, since Dick didn’t feel like saying much, and all he had to do was nod along and give positive input every few sentences. 

They decided to go to the pet store first, even though Alfred and Titus were spoiled and needed nothing. Dami picked out some kind of motorized toy mouse that hid under a mat and darted in and out strategically for Alfred, and then several cow knees for Titus. Dick thought it kind of funny how Alfred got the cleverly designed toys, whereas Titus, forever idiotic, got leftover animal parts. Maybe the dog was just too big to handle anything sophisticated. 

“What about this one for Titus?” he’d asked, holding a rubber toy the size of a softball. It had slots where treats could be inserted, and the packaging promised “hours of entertainment” as the dog rolled the ball around trying to extract them. 

A look of long-suffering came over Dami’s face. “Unfortunately,” he said, eyes lidded, “Titus is far too much of a dunce for that contraption.” 

It didn’t seem too complicated to Dick. Chew, have a treat come out. Chew some more, another treat. 

“Have you tried it with him?” 

“Yes,” Dami said frostily, “and he gave up after less than a minute because, even though I’d _shown him repeatedly_ , he couldn’t find it within himself to understand.” 

Dami’s chilly condemnation of the dog, as if he were a parent demoralized by a child’s dismal grades even after expensive tutoring, made Dick smile. By the time they left, they’d racked up a couple hundred dollars’ worth of purchases, most of the expensive items being for Alfred. 

“It is sensible,” Damian clarified, “to provide mind-stimulating toys to animals that will use them.” 

They hadn’t brought up the snake topic again, and Dick wondered how much mind stimulation one could possibly provide for a reptile. He certainly couldn't remember Mr. Iguana having the lizard version of Rubik's cubes or something similar. 

They went to the ice cream parlor. Dami got peach cobbler in a cone, while Dick got a single scoop of vanilla bean. Something bland, something he could tolerate. 

At first, it seemed like it worked. Dami looked content, and the outdoor seating of the ice cream parlor was quiet and serene. A few house sparrows hopped around, pecking bits of cone that previous customers had left behind, and their chirping reminded him of--

God, it just wasn’t a good day.

“What’s the difference between all your drawing pencils?” Dick asked, even though he already knew the answer. He needed a distraction. “When I was in school, the only thing they ever had was #2B.” 

“I am sure they had others,” Dami replied, “but that you weren’t exposed to them.” 

That began a mostly unilateral conversation about the different grades of graphite pencils, how and when to use them, and how they compared to charcoal pencils. It lasted all the way to the Manor, and when Dami hopped upstairs, saying he’d been inspired to draw something, Dick took the opportunity to run to the Cave.

He’d spent most of the drive home swallowing back the saliva, a warning from his body that he needed to throw up. If he kept his chin up and focused on the road and Dami’s voice, it wasn’t so bad, but the moment they got home, things worsened.

So now he’s in the massive bathroom in the Batcave. He’d chosen it because there’d be no way for Dami to hear him retching, and it’s a damn good thing, because he feels like he’s fucking dying. Ice cream is basically a liquid by the time it reaches the stomach, and throwing it up isn’t so much productive as an exercise in misery. 

By the time he’s done, he still feels sick, and now his mouth is tainted by the taste of stomach acid. He goes to the showers, takes a quick rinse, brushes his teeth, and dresses in fresh clothes. He heads back out into the Cave proper, and is about to go to the elevator when he sees Bruce in one of the chairs. 

Bruce, who’s probably heard everything. 

Fuck it all.

“You look tired,” is all Bruce says, and that’s true. Dick is tired. But more than that. Something other than nauseation is building in his stomach. Just looking at Bruce, sitting there so calmly as Dick himself had been throwing up his insides and gagging on the taste, his sternum clenching and face sweating and muscles sore--

Fuck. it. all.

“No,” he says sharply, and he feels like a door inside him has been unlocked. This level of rage-- it’s not going to be warranted. Bruce doesn’t deserve it. But he can’t stop. “I’m fucking _angry_ , Bruce. I’m angry at every _fucking_ thing.” 

“... It’s okay to feel that way.” 

“Is it though? ‘Cause it seems like any time I feel anything but goddamn bliss everyone’s on top of it to save me from myself!” 

“We care about you--”

“So being cared about means I can’t be pissed off at all the bullshit _you’ve_ put us through? You _knew_! You knew what we’d be getting into! You led us into it!” 

On another stage, with other players --Jason instead of Dick, for instance-- this would be the part in the script that Bruce starts yelling back, gets up and slams a chair into the table, does anything but _this_. This, passively taking it, allowing Dick to hurl these ugly words at him. 

Somehow, it’s more infuriating than it would be if he were to stand up for himself.

That’s fine, though.

Dick has plenty of fuel to burn. 

“What were you _thinking_? Gordon was right, back then; he should’ve arrested Batman for _child endangerment_! Nine years old and putting me out there with psychos like the Joker? And then, you didn’t even learn after Jason? You had to get _Tim_ involved in that? It’s fucking negligent, Bruce! It’s worse than that! You actively chose to put us into situations where we could get maimed or traumatized or fucking killed!” 

He’s leaving Damian out of it. He knows he’s a hypocrite for it, but this anger of his-- if he were to even mention Dami’s name, it would all go up in flames. He takes a moment to breathe, feeling like his chest is lit on fire from the rage. He wants to throw an object, to punch the wall, to do _something_ to show Bruce his anger, but before he does, Bruce speaks.

“You’re right,” he says, and it momentarily stuns Dick into silence. “I made huge mistakes when I raised you all.”

“A mistake is leaving a soufflé in the oven too long, not turning your _children_ into _soldiers_.” 

“Then I caused catastrophes. You may never believe it, but at the time, those possibilities hadn’t crossed my mind.” 

“Yeah,” Dick says. “No one could _ever_ predict that sending elementary schoolers out to fight cartels would end badly.” 

Bruce continues to speak plainly, without emotion. “There are no excuses for me. I can’t tell you my reasoning because now, it doesn’t make sense even to me. But that’s how the past went, and no matter how much I wish otherwise, I can’t change it.” 

Bruce is stalemating him by not revealing what he actually feels. That’s his usual response when Dick gets angry beyond belief. Inside, he’s probably hurt by Dick’s words, and Dick should know better than to continue, but right now, he doesn’t care at all. 

“Is that what you told Jason about why he got killed? That’s just _how the past goes_? Funny how with me, I got a helluva lot more apologies.” 

Bruce’s face is impassive.

“How do you know I haven’t apologized to him?” 

“You two are like lighters and fuckin' gasoline.”

“We’ve… talked.” 

“Since when do you _talk_ with him?” 

“Since what’s happened,” Bruce says, and isn’t that hilarious-- his freakout back in March has now gone down as a major divider of time in this family: Before Freakout and After Freakout. B.F. and A.F. Maybe historians in the future will use that to document the history of the Batfamily.

There’s lots of those dichotomies in his life.

Before Bruce and After Bruce.

Before Robin and After Robin. 

Before Slade and After Slade. 

Before Damian and After Damian.

What’s another to add to the mix? He’ll barely notice, after all. 

“You’re not aware of everything that goes on, and you shouldn’t be. That’s not your responsibility.” 

“I’m the ‘heart’ of the family, supposedly. Kinda my job, don’t you think?” 

“There’s no such thing as ‘jobs’ when it comes to family, Dick.”

Dick feels a moment of bewilderment. It’s been coming together for a while now, in the background of his major malfunction, and now it’s finally coalesced enough for him to throw something tangible at it.

And, like he’s said--

He’s angry.

So fucking angry.

“Since when the _fuck_ are we a wholesome family enterprise? What are we now, The Brady Bunch? I’m a few cards short of a deck and suddenly everyone’s so nice and civil and loving?” 

“No one thinks you’re ‘a few cards short’--”

“No, fuck you, everyone’s talked to me about it.” 

“And do you think they're all telling the same lie?” 

_If everyone you meet is telling you the same lie, then_ you’re _the one in denial_.

Where had he heard that?

Slade.

Slade had told him that in one of his bizarre moments of ersatz wisdom, when he gave advice that could almost pass as fatherly in other, far less fucked-up situations. 

“It’s important to be able to meet people on their own level,” Slade explained to him one day, after he’d had to mediate a conflict between two of his minions. He’d told both of them to sit down, and for each to explain what was wrong and why they thought screaming at each other would solve it. And at the end, as some sort of strange maxim, he’d told his employees to remember-- _if everyone has a problem with you, then you’re most likely the problem_.

“Why didn’t you just beat them for misconduct?” Dick had asked sullenly. It was what always happened to _him_ , after all.

“Oh, Dick,” Slade said, voice dripping with amusement, “that’s no way to keep followers. Once you’ve got them trained, it’s a step backward to resort to punishment. Humans operate most effectively on a basis of frequent positive reinforcement.”

“That’s not what you’re doing with me.” 

“But you’re not trained yet, are you?” 

That duality, the juxtaposition of his calm with his employees versus his brutality with Dick… That solid knowledge of how to manipulate and what to use for it and the _training_ \-- dear god, _training_ fucking _humans_ like they were dogs, and worse than everything, how it had _worked on him_ , too--

It was different from any other villain he’d faced. The Joker was insane. The Riddler, a narcissistic savant. Two-Face was insane _and_ narcissistic. But Slade was--

Slade was keenly aware of what made people function, and he knew how to target it, and it felt as if there’d never be any escape.

And it’s fucked that Bruce is stating a variant of that aphorism, and that Dick’s agreeing with it not because of Bruce, or the situation, but because--

Slade had gotten him to agree with everything, eventually. 

“No,” he says, a smile tugging at his face like stitches put in too tight. “No, I don’t think that. I know you guys aren’t getting together to make up stories about how I’m losing it.” 

Bruce looks bewildered, like he can’t make sense of the bitter smile and the words accompanying it. Probably for the best. If he knew the reason behind it, he’d be appalled. 

“You’re right,” he continues. “I don’t think they’re stories. I’m starting to realize that I _am_ losing it.” 

Bruce opens his mouth to reply, but Dick leaves the Cave before he can. 

* * *

Prom night for Tim comes.

Bruce sends him off in style, in an understated yet rather expensive Audi, to go pick up Odette. Before he leaves, Dick gives him a pat on the back and says, “If all else fails, send me a text and I’ll pretend there’s an emergency so you can leave.” 

“Thanks,” Tim says, unironically, and then he’s out the door.

“I’m gonna head to Jason’s,” Dick says. “That way I can be closer to ground zero if Tim ends up needing extraction.” 

Gotham Academy is barely ten minutes from Jason’s house, so Jason's is a perfect place from which to respond. 

“It surely can’t be _that_ difficult,” Dami replies, coming down from his perch on the stairs where he’d watched the send-off. “He goes to soirees and receptions quite frequently.”

“It’s different when there’s a romantic partner involved,” Bruce muses, and then he waves Dick out of the house too. “Go hang out with Jason. Damian and I can hold down the fort here.” 

Dick gives Dami a hug and a hair ruffle, then he’s out. He’d already mentioned this potential intervention party to Jason, and he’d agreed to let his house be the nominal base of operations. 

In reality, that means sitting on the couch watching trashy TV while checking in with Tim via text every half hour. They’re not drinking, just in case they have to make up a convincing emergency situation. They’ve floated around ideas, but in his experience it’s best to think on the fly or things sound too stilted. 

“I feel old,” Dick says, after an hour and a half’s gone by. “Seems like yesterday I was a senior in high school, and tonight there we were sending Tim off. He’s gonna graduate in a few weeks, too.” 

“My little baby’s all grown up and attendin’ prom night,” Jason says, sounding like Eddie Murphy. Dick knows it’s a reference, but can’t quite place it. 

It’s serene, their little night on call. Jason’s stretched out on the couch, socked feet dangling over the edge of the armrest. He never wears shoes inside his own house, _especially_ not on the furniture. It’s something Dick’s noticed, vaguely and peripherally, over the past few months, but only now has it come together enough for him to ask.

“How come you always wear shoes when you’re over at the Manor? Is it just to piss off Alfred about the carpet?” 

A yawn comes. He’s not sure if Jason’s faking it to be nonchalant. 

“At first-- you know, when I was a kid, living with Willis, it was ‘cause I had to be able to leave quick in case someone started flipping out. Then, same with foster care and the streets. Gotta be ready. Then-- just habit, you know? In places that weren’t ‘mine’."

“Justified,” Dick says. “Sorry for thinking it was just about the carpet.” 

“Nah, it’s fuckin hilarious,” Jason says. “The whole thing, the shoes, the running, Willis beating the everloving shit out of me. Funniest part is I still managed to be happy with him sometimes.”

First off, Dick doesn’t think it’s funny, and secondly, he’s reminded of Damian, and what he said about Talia. But that’s neither here nor there. This is Jason’s time. 

“And I hate him. I hate him for what he did to me, and what he did to Catherine, and how he fucked us over. But some part of me, it takes up for him. One time he was absolutely wasted and there was no food to eat and I told him I was hungry. You know what he did?” 

Dick feels like it’s a rhetorical question, and he’s right, because a few seconds later Jason follows up.

“I was like, I don’t know, seven or eight. And it was really late at night. And he took me to his car and we drove to the Dairy Queen across town and got me something to eat. And I remember not even being able to eat it because I was terrified he was going to crash and kill us, but at the same time I knew not to mention him being drunk because I might get beaten because of it.” 

“That sounds terrifying.” 

“it was, and despite all of it, how shitty he was, my brain picks that to focus on. Like, _Oh, my dad bought me food this one time, so he can’t be a terrible person_.” 

Dick wants to confess something. 

He feels that way about Slade sometimes, too.

Sure, Slade raped him and beat him and did things that have left him fucked up for life, but… to his credit, he never let any of his employees rape Dick, and he didn’t leave him _permanently_ physically injured, and when Dick performed well, he let off on the punishments, and--

Look at him, rationalizing the actions of someone like _Slade_. Jesus Christ. 

Forget about _losing_ it; he’s already lost it completely.

“Let’s go out,” Dick says.

“We’re supposed to be on call for Tim. Are you suggesting we commit dereliction of said sacred duty?” 

“Come on,” Dick says. “Tim’s told me for the hundredth time that he’s fine, and you need to get your mind on something other than the case. It’s going to eat you alive.” 

“At least I _am_ alive,” Jason snorts. “People call that a good thing.” 

He pulls himself up into a sitting position and eyes Dick like a hawk surveying an owl. Two deadly creatures in their own right, just different circumstances and locations and behaviors. 

“Yeah, they do,” Dick says. 

“Fuck ‘em.” 

“Fuck ‘em,” Dick agrees. “Anyway, I was thinking we could go to El Club De Los Cabrones.” 

“Dick Grayson,” Jason says with mock shock, “going to a _strip club_?” 

“You like playing poker there, asshole. I don’t care about the titty show. I’ll just… chaperone.” 

“Chaperone?” 

“I don’t _know_ ,” Dick says, chest heavy with exasperation. “I’ll make sure you don’t-- get too fucked up-- or whatever.”

“I wonder if Tim shoulda hadda chaperone with that Odette chick.” 

“Oh my god,” Dick says. “No. We are _not_ talking about that.” 

Jason sniggers, but he does stand up. “Who knows, maybe Timbo has some fresh moves.”

“Nope,” Dick says again. “I refuse to acknowledge that hypothetical. They’re having a nice night, and it’s going to stay that way, and if something does _happen_ , it’ll go great for them and everyone will be happy and--”

“Still living in a fantasy,” Jason laughs. 

Yeah. The fantasy of a normal life, excluded from the fucking dysfunction that’s worked itself into every waking moment. It feels like the roots of a black walnut tree, growing and growing, infiltrating every accessible area and taking up room where there should be none. Drawing energy and dispersing allelopathic chemicals through the soil, ensuring that anything that grows will be stunted, and unhealthy, and--

No.

Fuck that.

“We’re going,” Dick says firmly. “If you don’t want to go there, we can go wherever the hell you want. But we’re going _somewhere_. Tim’s out enjoying himself; we should too.” 

“Jeez, I’m sorry if I’m ever this obnoxious when I try to get you to do something.” 

Nevertheless, he seems convinced. He runs upstairs to grab a baseball hat, and brings down one to Dick too. That’s enough of a disguise for seedy, dimly lit places like the bar they’re going to. No one looks too closely at anyone’s face, and even if they do, they’re too drunk to recognize someone anyway. 

Dick drives them to the bar-- in his car, not Carlita. Driving gives him a reason not to drink, another one on top of keeping an eye on Jason. It’s not as if Jason even needs a guiding hand, though; at this point he could probably manage three times the alcohol Dick can. 

When they arrive, Jason heads off to the poker tables and quickly intimates himself into a game. Dick chooses as a spot at the bar where he can both observe Jason and maintain relative seclusion. It’s up against the wall, right by the side door to the place.

The bartender gives him his order, a simple soda water with a wedge of lime to imitate a gin and tonic. From that, he sits and watches. Not just Jason-- no need for surveillance that close. The people coming in and out, the barbacks and waitresses. Every so often he checks his phone to see if there’s a new text from Tim, but the coast seems clear for him. At this point, if everything’s going well, Dick’s not going to be the one who interrupts their session of… whatever they’re doing. 

As the night goes on, more people filter in, and before long someone’s sat on the stool beside him. They’re not particularly close together, so it’s not awkward, but Dick still gives the person a glance out of customary paranoia. It’s a man in a simple T-shirt and jeans. He looks much the same as any other guy in the bar here. If anything, Dick’s the one overdressed, in a dress shirt and slacks-- an appropriate “responsible big brother” disguise to rescue Tim, if needed. 

As he’s transitioning his attention back to the crowd, the movement of the man’s arm catches his eye. He’s calling the bartender, and as he orders a whiskey on the rocks, Dick observes the tattoo on his arm. 

It’s a sports logo. The same one as on the keychain from the girl. What luck. 

“Gotham NightHawks,” he says to the man. “Thought nobody remembered them anymore.” 

“Surprised you do,” the man replies. “You seem a little young.” 

Dick smiles. 

“Maybe,” he says, with that perfect inflection in his voice-- _maybe you’d like to find out?_

God, it’s so fucking easy. 

It’s so _fucking_ easy.

“My grandpa was obsessed with them, although from what I hear, they weren’t great.” 

The man leans back in his chair a little, presses his feet against the undersurface of the bar wall. 

“There were some… management issues,” he admits. “I was a fan like your grandpa, but the first manager stole money from the team accounts and it was downhill from there.” 

Perfect. This man has more knowledge about the team than the average person. It’s not exactly _classified_ , but it had come out back in the early ‘90s, before Dick was even born. Before the spread of information via the internet, small scandals like that were much less well-known, and Dick had only found it via an obscure sports website entry for the NightHawks. 

It’s not as if he’s planned it, and Jason wouldn’t approve, but what he doesn’t know won’t hurt him. If Dick can reel this man into further conversation, who knows what might come out? He can help, he can be useful, he can take some of the weight off Jason. 

“What game of theirs was your favorite?” he asks. The man thinks for a minute, and then goes off on a spiel, mentioning this player and that move. Dick knows exactly zero about hockey, but the man clearly doesn’t care. Dick only has to nod along. 

The conversation continues for what must be another hour. Dick periodically checks his phone and surveys Jason. Everything’s going well. The man’s five drinks in at this point. 

“It’s getting a little hot in here,” he says. “How about we go get some fresh air?” 

“Actually,” he says, “I think I--”

“Come on,” the man says. 

He’s smiling a little, a quick glint of teeth showing behind his lips. This close, Dick sees it. 

He’s missing a tooth.

Left maxillary canine.

He is--

What are the odds?

This can’t be.

“I’ve got to--”

The man stands up, goes behind him, puts his hands on Dick’s shoulders. Dick glances around. No one’s watching. 

He’s big. About Jason’s size. He’s not as muscular, of course, because hardly anyone is, but in these situations it often becomes a matter of size difference more than anything else. 

Dick stands up as well. He could get him off. He could. Even with the weight he’s lost, he’s still much stronger than the average person. He’s got the training and the muscle memory. He could get away, using leverage and the proper technique. 

But.

That’s not something a normal person would know.

He doesn’t need to attract attention. 

The wrong kind of attention.

This right here-- this is the only attention he’s used to, anyway. 

If he can get him vulnerable, alone-- he can find out for sure.

This is a sacrifice he’s got to make.

He owes it to the kids, to his family, to Gotham. He’s the only one who can or should do it; everyone else with their bodies like sacred temples while his is--

His is--

Meant to be used.

And he really doesn’t--

God. 

He doesn’t _want_ this.

And even more--

What would Damian say, if he found out?

He talks about good examples and yet this. This is what he’s doing. _He doesn’t want to_. This position, the implication of what’s coming, being so close to another human this way-- it’s all disgusting. It makes his stomach roil and his head spin. But that doesn’t matter, does it? It’s just that--

This is what he’s good for.

If he can get the man’s DNA, a solid sample, especially semen-- that could be the break in the case. He curses that his nails are kept so short; there’s no guarantee he’d be able to get enough of a skin sample that way. Hair’s tricky; it has to be taken with the root intact, or it’s useless. And there’s no chance that saliva will remain an intact sample after interaction with the environment.

This is his chance. This is his opportunity to save more children. That is, if it turns out to be true. If his suspicions are correct. _If_.

And if it’s not correct, then what’s one more encounter added to a list of dozens?

So he forces himself to relax, to channel his nervousness into a laugh of, “I don’t really-- I’ve never done is before, so--” 

“I’ll take care of you,” he says, and his hands are like vises on Dick’s arms. He uses his back to open the side door. It lets out into the bar’s parking lot. 

Thirty feet away, he sees a man and a woman standing by the door of the bar, smoking and chatting. Then the man comes into his field of vision, and he’s tall enough that Dick can’t see anything but him. 

When the kiss comes he’s expecting it, and he lets his mouth open for him without struggle. The more incognito he can be about this, the better. The man’s hands start palming at his body, and Dick pretends he doesn’t feel it. 

This goes on for a few minutes, kissing and groping, and Dick feels the man growing harder. It’ll be his time to act soon. He’s going over it in his head, how and where he’s going to accomplish it, when someone speaks. 

“Fucking excuse me,” comes a voice from behind the man, and Dick feels involuntary relief ride through his body because it’s Jason. It’s Jason and he’s here and it’s going to be _okay_.

And then it’s very _not_ okay, because Jason shouldn’t be here, he shouldn’t be seeing this, he doesn’t _know_ who or what this man is-- 

Jason’s not _drunk_ , but he’s not sober. Dick won’t be able to reason with him. His only hope is that Jason’ll get the hint and wander off. 

“We’re a little busy here, dude,” he says, as if he doesn’t know who Jason is. 

“Yeah,” comes the man’s harsher tones. “Get lost.”

Then, to Dick’s immense alarm, he realizes the man has a knife in his pocket. How could he have missed that? How could he have been so fucking stupid? He always, _always_ checks--

Except for when he’s dumb and useless and out of practice, just like now. 

The man’s hand is on the knife when he speaks again. “Didn’t you hear me? I said _get lost_.” 

“That’s gonna be a no from me,” Jason says, and he reaches out to grab the man off of Dick, and Dick begins to yell, but he can’t say a thing because suddenly-- suddenly--

The man flips his blade open and draws it in one long line across Jason’s belly, and Dick’s hysteria intensifies since it’s wickedly curved, doubly serrated, just like the ones Slade had loved so much for their ability to do harm. Red unfolds before Dick’s eyes, skin and muscle and viscera. 

His own scream becomes audible to his ears as Jason thumps to the ground, and the couple that’s still by the front door comes running over. The woman’s calling 911. Blood’s coming quickly through the ragged remains of Jason’s tee, and Dick sees the man running to his car in his periphery. 

Remain calm. That’s the first line of advice for people in these situations, and Dick can’t fucking do it. He’s tearing off his own shirt, leaving himself in just an undershirt, and pressing it against the wound. It makes Jason cry out and Dick sobs in response. He knows it’s necessary but the sound still rips through him. It’s doing more good than harm, he tells himself; he’s a licensed EMT, after all. He know what he’s doing. Bruce has always insisted on the certification for every adult in the Batfamily. It doesn’t make him feel any less powerless. 

“You’re gonna be just fine, Jay,” and maybe if he were in a more rational state of mind he could use his training, assess the injury logically, decide if his panic is warranted, but right now--

His brother is laid out on the pavement in front of him, belly torn open, and it’s _all his fault_. 

With sirens wailing in the background, Jason gasps out, “Well, at least it wasn’t the Joker.” 

No. He can’t say that. He can’t act as if he’s going to _die_. 

If there’s an incident of violence police officers must secure the scene before EMTs can deploy. The flashing lights of the cop cars and ambulance strobe their way down the street, emitting into the parking lot, and suddenly--

Dick can’t be Nightwing. He can’t be. There’s a shadow over him, and Dick looks up to see a GCPD officer. 

“He’s my brother,” he says. “He’s my brother, and he’s been stabbed, and I--”

“Okay, calm down,” the police officer says, and Dick wants to rip away from him. He’s not a civilian, he’s not _stupid_ , he knows what this means--

He’s continuing with the pressure, and it’s strange but Jason’s hands around his wrists feel more stable than his own. His brother’s still just _looking_ at him, maybe a little dazed now, but--

His eyes are open. That’s good. 

Dick springs on the EMTs as soon as they’re in earshot. “I’m licensed too, he’s my brother, he has-- _conditions_ , I’ve gotta stay with him, ride in the back. He’s gonna panic otherwise.” 

They’ve already got a stretcher out and are moving Jason onto it. They’re all working in conjunction, so dedicated to saving life. 

_And somebody had the utter fucking nerve to bring me back to this hellhole_ , Jason had said.

Dick’s sorry that he’s not sorry.

He has that utter fucking nerve, too.

  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ya'll, I'm sorry this took so long to get out. Life's been really difficult for me recently, but I wanted to get this out before 2021 hits, so I worked extra hard these past few days. If you enjoyed this read, or were happy to see the update, I'd really love to hear from you in the comments. Like I said, life's been difficult, but reading your thoughts on this story always cheers me up. 
> 
> Happy 2021!


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